I am trying to figure out what settings I need in my bios. I would like to boot and install with a single SATA Hd (36GB Raptor) windows xp. I have the floppy driver disk working so the install works. And I can see the drive from my existing installation of XP on an WD IDE hd. It seems all it takes in my bios is to enable SATA so that I can see it from windows. When I reboot after first stage it won't go on and gives me some errors about non system disk or disk error I think. On one screen there is settings for enabling SATA. Then an option under that asks for SATA or RAID. AS well as on the same screen turning on GigaRaid. I don't want to raid as I only have one drive. However under the GIGAraid there is a setting for ATA or RAID. I have seen some postings say turn that on. Then on another screen there is the boot order. This is slightly confusing as well. it shows settings for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd drive then a boot order. The options in the boot order are SCSI/SATA/RAID. I can only change the order on that line if one of the boot drives is set to SCSI. (even though I have no SCSI drive) Under the options for the individual drives (1st boot device, 2nd boot etc..) are the ability to boot: USB Zip CDROM IDE-0 - IDE-3 SCSI Somebody did tell me today that it might be a good thing to reset my cmos which I have not done. Also so far after many different trys of changing settings in the bios it never shows any indication in the bios of what kind of SATA HD it is. Any clue on this. The gigabyte tech support tells me it can boot sata. But they have yet to fully answer my question on what the settings should be. Or their answers confuse me more.

If you have a setting in the BIOS to enable SATA then enable it. Then, put the SATA disk drivers on a floppy disk and begin the Windows install process. Watch carefully for "Press F6 to install SCSI...." When you see that, hit F6 and stick the floppy with your SATA drivers into the floppy drive and point the install at it when it requests them. You need the drivers installed to allow windows to "see" the drive and finish the install.

Sorry, haven't done this for a while and I forgot to add, once you press F6, you'll have to choose the type of storage device you're about to install drivers for. You don't want to choose SCSI....you want to choose SATA and then point to the floppy with the drivers on it so the system can load them. It's been a while since I installed onto a SATA drive and I don't remember exactly what options come up when you press F6. But I know you'll be able to figure it out as it's not that hard.

"And I can see the drive from my existing installation of XP on an WD IDE hd. It seems all it takes in my bios is to enable SATA so that I can see it from windows." This sentence does not really make sense No system disk means the drive your trying to boot from does not have an operating system on it. In advanced bios feature set the first boot device to: "SCSI" alternatively you can set "SCSI" to second boot device and have "floppy" as first boot device - just make sure there are no floppy disks in the drive when u turn your computer on Then go into SATA/RAID/SCSI boot order Make sure SATA is at the top of the list In integrated peripherals: Leave Gigaraid and SATA raid functions off (although it won't affect anything if theyre enabled, it will just make bootup take slightly longer) Make sure onboard serial ATA function is enabled Now as long as you new windows installation is OK it should boot

CurtR is on target. I think your problem is that you are trying to install XP on the SATA drive from within XP. You need to install from the CD as CurtR stated. Afterward you can lose the original WinXP installation if you want to. It would probably be best if you disconnected the HD that currently has XP installed on it.

Ahh sorry. I thought u'd already installed windows on the new drive but couldn't stop it tying to boot from the old one.

Thanks for all the replies.. Your help on this is very much appreciated! Well I apologise for not making this clearer. Im not trying to install it from within XP. I started out with my existing system and verified the drive works by installing it with my existing install of xp on an IDE hd. With that said. I am at work typing this reply it might not have said the right error message regarding the boot after XP is copied over. Just so I make this clear I do the F6 part and it copies over files but then does not boot from the SATA drive. So im sure its a problem with settings in the bios. I am sure without a doubt that Dr. K. Kennedy's answer is the one I need.. I will try it when I get home. Thanks so much for the suggestion. And to everyone else I appreciate the help sorry I didnt make it clearer. I was just certain what I had wrong was bios settings. Most likely within the boot order which Dr. Kennedy answered very clearly. Thanks again everybody!