Windows 7 reinstallation problem

Hello

I have a high end laptop (Clevo) with two discs in a RAID 1 configuration. I use this as a desk top replacement for office work and CAD.

On several occasions in the past I have installed new discs and re-established the computer from scratch from the Windows 7 Ultimate installation CD All without problems. The last time was about 18 months ago.

Well, it was getting a bit slow and messy – software rot – and had crashed a few times recently which caused the RAID to rebuild which takes ages and slows everything up.

This morning I decide to install a new pair of discs and start again from scratch.

All went well until the last few minutes of the operating system loading when I got a message saying that the operating system could not be configured because of the hardware on this computer.

After checking all that I could check I tried again but with the same result.

After 4 attempts, I reinstalled the old discs and it is now working again.

Does anyone have any idea what could have prevented the operating system loading –it worked perfectly 18 month ago and I have not installed any additional hardware since then?

Any assistance will be acknowledged.

 

When you say "After checking all that I could check...", what exactly did you check?
Are you referring to hardware tests of CPU, HDD, RAM, graphics card, etc.?
If so, what tests/apps did you run and what were the results?

"Software rot"... that's an apt description of the inevitable and mysterious OS decay that every Windows user eventually experiences.

 

Thanks rustysavage

Well my testing was not extensive or thorough…

I took out the memory cards and cleaned the contacts and removed a USB receiver for the cordless mouse. I also checked that the new discs were correctly installed and the connectors were pushed fully home.

But look – before I removed the old discs and after I replaced them the computer worked and is working correctly. What could the installation routine have found that stopped it installing?

I need the computer to work on so I have not got the time to experiment, but during the next few days I will install the new discs in turn in the third disc bay on this computer and run chkdsk. I don’t have any other tools.