How to install XP to SATA drive without floppy

Have a Gateway laptop with a dead (SATA) hard drive. Replaced drive and tried to install XP Home from a retail disk. Install does not recognize the drive. Gateway support (don't get me started) says they don't have a restore disk and to use a retail XP install disk and their linked drivers. Their link is broken, but I got the appropriate drivers (iaahci & iastor) and tried to slipstream them into the XP install disk with nLite. No joy. XP Install still does not see the hard drive.

Let me say that I got the iastor and iaahci files by extracting them from a floppy image from the intel site using winimage, and I think I have the right files. I have the .inf and .cat files plus iastor.sys. I put them in a folder and told nLite to add them as drivers, which it appeared to do. I wrote an iso, which I then burned, but when I boot it, it doesn't see the hard drive. I don't have access to a USB floppy.

I need suggestions and detailed instructions on constructing a working boot/install CD.

Thanks,
CJon

 

as far as i know you either need an actual floppy drive or a usb floppy to get this to work. I'd love to hear otherwise.

Does BIOs see the hdd? I just want to make sure that it's actually a sata driver issue and not something else.

 

Yes, and, in fact, I can restore an image to it with Macrium Reflect's WinPE boot disk. Of course, that image is corrupt because it came off the failing drive. I can also "see" it with UBCD4Win and Knoppix. It is only the stupid XP Install disk that refuses to see it.

I've seen a number of discussions about slipstreaming the drivers into an install CD, but have so far been unsuccessful. I think I am probably not getting the correct/complete drivers. Trying to pull them out of a floppy image and then unpack them seems to be the major hangup.

 

is this for Windows xp professional? There is a guy named Maher that released a Windows xp professional CD with a bunch of sata drives. You may try looking the following up on Google: "windows xp pro sp3 maher"

It's the first result for me.

 

You can use nLite to roll the sata drivers into your install disk.
Or go into the BIOS and set the sata to legacy or IDE if there is an option other than ahci.

 

Hello,
Try using Gparted to partition and format the Hard Drive first. Then see if the Xp install disk with the slipstreamed drivers will see the drive.

 

Here is a nice step by step guide on using Nlite to slipstream sata drivers to XP installation.

 

Takes me to a pirate torrent site, complete with a porn link. thanks, but no.

 

Did you look into my solutions?

 

foogoo - Not yet. Took a quick look at the pirate site and dumped that. d/l the pdf from tgell, but haven't had a chance to read it or to look at the BIOS yet. Had to visit family today. They are on my list for tomorrow. Thanks for your help.

 

There's no porn pop ups on that site..

 

Nlite works great
Most likely you have slipstreamed the wrong sata drivers or not all of them...
Does BIOS see your new sata drive??

 

to thisisu:
May not be actual porn, but scantily clad females popping up wanting to meet me is not appropriate for a tech site.
And a torrent site at that.

 

ASUS - Yes, BIOS sees the drive.

Foogoo - No way to to set SATA to anything. SATA is not mentioned anywhere in the BIOS. I think this is the problem. BIOS sees the drive, but hasn't a clue what to do with it without specific drivers that can only be loaded from a floppy, which I don't have. My choices for LBA are DOS or Other, "for use with UNIX or other non-DOS OS"

I'm pretty sure I have to integrate the SATA drivers into the install CD, and I think Tgell's PDF may hold the answer, but it is 24 pages, and I'm just getting started.

I have both nLite and an old copy of autostreamer, which I have used to slipstream service packs into install disks before. I think either will do the job, but nLite looks easier. I just have to find the right drivers and get them into a form I can use them.

 

Which model laptop--maybe we can find a link to the sata drivers?

 

You need to slipstream them as textmode drivers. See image #11 here http://xdot.tk/nliteimages.html.
For this you need a file named TXTSETUP.OEM along with your .sys and .inf files.

 

This worked like a champ. No doubt it helped that, coincidentally, I'm restoring the same model gateway you used in your example. Talked about a tailored response!!!

Anyway, my new install disk is happily formatting the drive a as I write this, and with any luck the rest of the install will proceed without a hitch.

Also, thanks to Captcha, who had the right answer as well. It was simply a matter of grabbing the right drivers and getting the textmode drivers installed, including the textsetup.oem file, which was missing from the previous downloads I had extracted.

 

Thanks for the feedback. I found that the guide I posted is one of the best regarding slipstreaming SATA drivers into XP using nlite.

 

to cjon:
How did everything go?
OK I hope.