So, I wiped the Vista partition on my laptop in preparation of installing Windows XP, using a slipstreamed install disc with the Intel SATA drivers for my ICH8-M chipset. Only problem was, the license on the copy of XP I had (from when I was a student in college before enlisting) had expired, and the CD Key proved to be no good. I bought another copy of XP Pro online, but I threw away the old CD with the driver on it that I needed, and now have no way to boot the XP install CD.
I tried getting the drivers off of the Intel website, but the Intel Matrix Storage Manager install program won’t even run on my computer, insisting that my desktop doesn’t meet the requirements and exiting itself before I can get the drivers I need. As y’all can imagine, this is very frustrating.
Does anyone know how I can extract the drivers I need, or even better, does anyone use a laptop that has an Intel chipset in it that can run the program and get the INF file for my chipset for me? I’m not asking anyone to help me pirate windows or drivers or anything, I own legal copies of everything involved, I just can’t get the stupid SATA driver out of the weird install program Intel devised for it.
XP keys expire? I havent seen an expired one yet in 3 years of owning a computer repair biz.
Usually sata drivers have to be installed from a floppy during the windows installation. This obviously is a royal PITA if you do not have a floppy drive on your laptop. you drop the drivers onto the floppy the wait for the famous “f6 to install other drivers”. This interface will only talk to a floppy drive.
We have usb floppy drives just for this situation.
Expired or something, it didn’t work. In any case, this was from a free license of XP I got when I was a student in Arizona, I’m not sure if those keys are good indefinitely, or if I was somehow given a copy of XP with the wrong CD or something. Basically, they had a page of CD keys and a copy of XP on a CD. You check the CD out of the library, install it with the key they give you, and return the disc.
Basically, I wrote down the key and copied the disc. If somehow there was a copy-protection setup on the disc, or if karma just decided to have fun at my expense for not intending to install XP right then, then eh, serves me right, bought a new copy of XP to replace it.
I grabbed the floppy utility thing, and I’m gonna see if I can’t just slipstream the INF files from that into an XP install disc and have that work. I’ll let you know if my laptop explodes in response.
OK, the floppy disc didn’t work, but it turned out the previous attempt at instaling Windows still left all the base stuff there, so I was able to just boot up into the half-installed XP, put in the new disc when it asked for it, and then put in the new CD Key. Voila!
Now I just need to get Wifi set up and I’m golden. Thanks for the help!
