Hi all, tried to install vista a few times now, keep experiencing the same problem. I suspect it is related to my hardware config and was just wondering if anyone runs a similar rig and has worked around it... Specs are A64 4000+ 2048 Corsair XMS (2-3-3-6) 160GB SATA HDD (Primary boot partition) 160GB PATA RAID 0 HDD (2x 80GB ) ASUS A8N - E M/B (Nforce 4 ultra) GF6800 Various other bits that shouldnt matter.... Due to the fact that i am installing vista to my raid array i need to run the install from XP (cannot seem to get the raid drivers to load if i boot from the cd). I don't think this is causing a problem but might be wrong... I get through the first stage of the install ok, then it reboots the machine and starts stage 2. Some point through stage 2 (not the same every time) it gets a file error and begins to roll back the installation. The roll back inevitably hangs (no hdd activity and nothing happening after over an hour) and then after rebooting it (and letting vista go again to keep trying) chkdsk runs and finds heaps of file errors on the vista partition, the rollback continues and then i get another hang. The hangs (and forced reboots) continued a few times with chkdsk flagging more errors every time it starts up - i even scored a BSOD (BAD_POOL_CALLER) in there for my troubles. On the last reboot chkdsk identifies errors on all of my partitions and then when vista starts up i end up in a command window and thats it. To remove vista properly i have to run the xp recovery console and fix the bootsector. The last time this happened i also had the problem that chkdsk would run and then hang on my second partition (part of the raid setup) and once i got back into XP the drive was not accessible anymore. After running chkdsk about 5 times, rebooting every time it hung i got the drive back, but i am worried if i go again it might happen to my boot drive and i might not be so lucky ( i dont favour reinstalling windows and all of my software again for no reason if i can help it). I am using the latest nVidia vista drivers for my raid setup. Do not really want to give the XP drivers a go in case vista destroys the array properly. Has anyone else succeeded on this type of setup? Before it is suggested i have tried testing the memory and the raid array for errors. Before i installed vista on the raid i had data filling the full 160GB with no errors and actually had to free up enough room to create the partition. I have also slackened off the memory timings as it was suggested on the microsoft forum that vista might not tolerate tight timings yet... Would really love to get this OS going....

Sounds to me like it's the RAID drivers. Have you checked to see if your drivers are built into the latest build? If not, then that's where I'd suggest that you start. if you can't boot from the CD to begin the install I wouldn't bother installing it (you'll probably have all sorts of performance issues)...

Have now got a successful install up and running (kinda). I am running the latest build nforce drivers for vista (nvidia only offers beta at this point), and have the 1013 bios for my A8N - E. Ended up partitioning my SATA disk which is not part of the array and installing to that. Installation was pretty good with a couple of extra reboots i was not expecting after long periods of inactivity. Unfortunately my raid array is very flaky under vista to the point that i am disabling it in bios before i boot vista as xp detects file errors at startup every time i reboot after using vista even if i do not deliberately access the drive, and the only thing on the drive is games and mp3's so vista has no reason to look at it either. Have emailed nvidia for support but none is offered as yet. Would really like to know if anyone else has got vista going on an nforce 4 ultra chipset board with raid enabled? Also if anyone is using the nvidia XP raid drivers successfully instead of the vista ones?