Well, I seem to have hit a wall with Vista RC1. I have tried the following:

Install 64-bit via booting from the 64-bit DVD, not from within Windows.

Install 32-bit version from within windows, then from booting the 32-bit DVD.

I am installing to an internal IDE hard drive designated D:, which has two partitions. My Windows XP Pro is on a RAID configuration of SATA drives which is one large partition. It's also, unusually, designated I: instead of C: This has never proved to be a problem with any program except the Norton Utilities installater.

I am repeatedly getting the error that Vista cannot find Winload.exe or it's corrupt.

I have tried Sabretooth's suggestions found in the 10/10 post "Installing Vista RC1 for dual boot."

Editing my boot.ini in XP added the choice of Windows XP to the new Windows Vista boot loader, but it doesn't work - and I get a new error message. When I choose "Earlier windows version" I am taken to my original Windows XP boot menu - which is Windows XP and Recovery Console.

So now I have several "Windows.old" folders from each attempt at installing Vista, and a Vista boot screen that takes me nowhere. My Windows XP installation is fine and unchanged, but I have yet to boot into Vista.

If anyone has any new ideas I'd love to hear them. I've been googling and perusing Vista forums but can't seem to find any answers...

My profound thanks!

-travis

Try this.

The Secret Letter From Iraq

When I tried the System Recovery option I got this message:

"This version of System Recovery Options is not compatible with the version of Windows you are trying to repair. Try using a recovery disc that is compatible with this version of windows."

I'm using the 32-bit DVD with the 32-bit version of Vista I installed within XP. UNLESS, the 64-bit is still in there, even though the subsequent installations said they were moving current installations into "Windows.old" folders.

I am vexed.

Is there a way to clean off all of the installations, the boot loader, and start over from the beginning?

Try your 64-bit DVD.

If all else fails you can always delete all Vista related folders and start from scratch.

Okay - here's an update:

The 64-bit DVD did get the Recovery process going, but to no avail.

So I followed some instructions on removing Vista - which involved this bit:

"g:\boot\bootsect.exe /nt52 ALL /Force"

At the run prompt to remove the boot loader.

The boot loader is gone - but I cannot delete the folders on my drive. It says the files are in use. Not sure how that is happening. I tried formatting too - and it wouldn't let me.

So I tried installing Vista AGAIN after removing the boot loader. I received the same error.

Any thoughts?

And thanks for all the help so far!

-travis

If you cannot format the partition, how about deleting it and recreating the partition altogether. But be careful and pay attention to the partition you are deleting.

Once that is succesfully done, try the install again.

The Secret Letter From Iraq

I was able to delete and recreate the partition.

Then I reinstalled the 32-bit DVD while in XP.

I chose "update during installation" or whatever the exact name is. It got hung-up for nearly an hour on the "installing updates" part and the progress bar never moved. I had to reboot.

I was able to rollback that installation and try again.

With the rollback, the boot loader was gone and my installation drive was empty of any stray files. So I fired it up again.

When it restarted, it went right back to the "winload missing or corrupt" error.

I'm assuming this is happening because my system drive is I: and somewhere in the code they have it written to look for a file under C:

This is what happened to me with Norton Utilities, and I can't find any other possilbe culprit.

For anyone who is counting this was 7 installation attempts and 7 failures.

Nonetheless, thanks for all the help.

"I'm assuming this is happening because my system drive is I: and somewhere in the code they have it written to look for a file under C:"

Have you tried going to Disk Management & reassigning the drive letter?

"I chose "update during installation" or whatever the exact name is. It got hung-up for nearly an hour on the "installing updates" part and the progress bar never moved. I had to reboot."

That's a foul move right there, usually you don't want that, if there is a file version or driver conflict, the installation will be botched - maybe that's what happened on the last attempt ;-(

Delete and recreate the partition again. Run the installation and DO NOT CHOOSE the "update during installation" option.

Once again goodluck!

The Secret Letter From Iraq

"Delete and recreate the partition again. Run the installation and DO NOT CHOOSE the "update during installation" option."

No dice.

Once again, I got the ever present "Winload error"

And to answer Jam's question, I cannot change the volume designation, because it's my system volume. I may not have made that clear.

Is it possible there is something left over from the 64-bit version installation or a failed installation that's leading the winload astray?

Could it be possessed? Anyone know if that's possible? I think it might be possessed. Or gremlins.

I opened the windows\system32 folder and found winload.exe - it's a 915kb file described as an "os loader." File version 6.0.5600.16384

Why does this file hate me?

Also, the installation screen does say to expect the computer to restart several times during installation, but mine restarts when "expanding files" is at about 27%. Anyone know if that's normal?

Also, I have run the "upgrade advisor" twice just to make sure everything is compatible and it is. I mean, I knew this just from reading specs, but wanted to make sure the advisor said so as well.

The whole time I'm doing this I just keep picturing the Mac guy from those ads saying stuff like "Hey, I'll be over here making a DVD and listening to some music and using my advanced spotlight search feature and blah blah frakking blah."

Maybe part of the this "beta test" is to see how many times schmucks like me will keep trying to install before losing their minds. Does that sound paranoid?

Grumble.

How about temporarily disconnecting the SATA/RAID config, setting up your IDE HDD as the primary master & doing a clean install of Vista? Once it's up & running, reconnect your RAID setup again & instead of having a dual boot, simply change the boot drive in the BIOS, depending on which OS you wanna use.

While I did not disconnect the SATA/RAID, I did make the IDE the primary drive in the BIOS.

At least, I made it the hard drive that the BIOS look for on bootup. The SATA is referred to in the BIOS as an "add-on card."

Disconnecting the drive seems a bit extreme, and I honestly don't want a configuration where I have to either reconnect my drive or reconfigure my BIOS every time I switch operating systems.

Nobody else seems to have this problem, so I'm convinced I somehow wronged Bill Gates.

I would love to show some empathy but that (to M$) automatically make me a friend of their enemy, and I'd rather be their friend................LOL

I agree disconnecting the drive seems a bit extreme, but it is a very good suggestion for a workaround, at least you can easily fix the boot once the install is successfully done.

Give it a shot or no Veesta for you.