AHCI and XP

[Jobos]

Just taken delivery of a load of HP machines. To clean off the crud I reinstalled XP but when I tried to boot from my XP cd or my UBCD I got a blue screen. I went into the BIOS and changed SATA emulation from AHCI to IDE and now booting from the XP cd works. I have reinstalled windows but now when I change the SATA emulation back to AHCI it just restarts partway through booting. I have installed the HP AHCI driver v8.7.0.1007 but still no luck.

 

 

What am I doing wrong?

[Jamo]

It will be restarting cus its blue screening during the boot. You can't usually change that setting after installing XP as it changes the controller driver needed from the OS.

 

I don't know of any way around this, I had the problem back when I worked at PC world, in the end I left it on IDE emu becuase of it. Not sure if a BIOS upgrade may sort it?

 

 

EDIT: Actually I believe it was a HP i had trouble with, :s

[srochford]

You should be able to follow the mult-step process on the HP Business Support forums Business support forums - SATA drivers for XP

 

Alternatively, it's probably easier to add the drivers to your XP install (press F6 when prompted etc), leaving the machine in AHCI mode all the way through

[Geoff]

When you install XP, you get an option to press 'f6' and load RAID controller drivers. You should be able to load the AHCI drivers at that point.

 

Also, make sure your using an XP disc with SP3 slipstreamed in.

[gshaw]

Personally I leave all machines on IDE emulation, can't see massive performance gains by using the AHCI mode and just more aggro for imaging with multiple storage drivers etc...

[BenABF]

Use Nlite or similar to slipstream the RAID/AHCI drivers to your XP install disk, press f6 and install the driver then enjoy

[Jobos]

@srochford

@geoff

 

So I rebooted from the XP cd and pressed f6. Now it's asking for the drivers on a floppy disk which these machines don't have.

 

 

@gshaw I might have to if I can't get AHCI working

[Jobos]

@srochford

 

Update: Your HP Business Support forum link worked

[Geoff]

So I rebooted from the XP cd and pressed f6. Now it's asking for the drivers on a floppy disk which these machines don't have.

 

With Vista and upwards it'll also accept a USB pen drive. However for XP you'll just have to add a floppy drive to the machine. Unless you slipstream the driver onto the install CD.

[sted]

With Vista and upwards it'll also accept a USB pen drive. However for XP you'll just have to add a floppy drive to the machine. Unless you slipstream the driver onto the install CD.

 

the problem ive found with usb floppy drives for f6 is they start ok then it later asks for the floppy again after seeming to disable the usb ports so i cant finosh the install. Only reliable way ive found is to nlite the drivers in. Finding drivers can be a pain took me all day to find them for an ati chipset toshiba grrr. same laptop with ahci turned on does seem a fair amount faster to me

[Jobos]

the problem ive found with usb floppy drives for f6 is they start ok then it later asks for the floppy again after seeming to disable the usb ports so i cant finosh the install. Only reliable way ive found is to nlite the drivers in. Finding drivers can be a pain took me all day to find them for an ati chipset toshiba grrr. same laptop with ahci turned on does seem a fair amount faster to me

 

Thanks to srochford's HP Business Support link I’ve got AHCI up and running and I agree with you there is a noticeable speed increase with AHCI enabled.

[andyrodger50]

the problem ive found with usb floppy drives for f6 is they start ok then it later asks for the floppy again after seeming to disable the usb ports so i cant finosh the install. Only reliable way ive found is to nlite the drivers in. Finding drivers can be a pain took me all day to find them for an ati chipset toshiba grrr. same laptop with ahci turned on does seem a fair amount faster to me

 

I had this problem once, where it says it cant find the files during the non-gui portion of setup. I found out the reason for this is because it looks in a specific folder for the drivers.

 

You have to put the drivers in the following path:

 

A:\$OEM$\TEXTMODE\

 

Should work after that. I have tested this method successfuly on several Dell PCs (Optiplex 755 and 760 spec) with AHCI turned on.

[EduTech]

I had all these problems with my Dell Machine. If i installed XP i had to turn AHCI off and if i had Vista or Windows 7 it had to be on.

 

I got loads of blue screens problems when re-imaging my machine, managed to do a Full Dick Repair and that seemed to have solved the issue.

 

Laptops/Desktops with the latest hardware in i.e. i7 processors etc just hate WindowsXP with a passion.

 

James.

[sted]

I had all these problems with my Dell Machine. If i installed XP i had to turn AHCI off and if i had Vista or Windows 7 it had to be on.

 

I got loads of blue screens problems when re-imaging my machine, managed to do a Full Dick Repair and that seemed to have solved the issue.

 

Laptops/Desktops with the latest hardware in i.e. i7 processors etc just hate WindowsXP with a passion.

 

James.

 

thats why teachers are now getting vista and if any software needs xp a vm of it

[Tallwood_6]

Unless these machines are using some decent SATA drives and they are getting really hammered, IDE Emulation is fine, haven't noticed much of a difference on the HP dc7900 we have here using ACHI and it proved a pain getting it working with windows PE.

[kearton]

Depending on your chipset, this link may be useful:

HOWTO: enable AHCI mode after installing Windows - PC Perspective Forums

[Cools]

i read some where AHCI saves on battery power and a 3% speed boot.

as as some one said use nlight get the right TXT mode driver installed that way ..

i have done with all my acers 5620Z.

and i use acronis to img them on to the server all with AHCI mode on.