jaclaz

Check: https://bearwindows.zcm.com.au/vga.htm jaclaz

Another (random ) idea. What if you replace all files (but the .sys driver) with the Dud? http://www3.telus.net/_/dud/ jaclaz

Try this one: https://forums.guru3d.com/threads/display-driver-uninstaller-thread.379505/ I am not too sure that latest is XP compatible, maybe you will need to dig up an older version. jaclaz P.S.: (about Covid-19 situation in Italy) The situation is (apart a small number of areas in the North where it is still dramatic ) relatively under control, in the sense that everyone is actually staying at home (people are largely respectful of the current rules) and the number of new cases is increasing at a much slower pace than it was until a few days ago, actually the curve has flattened, see: http://nrg.cs.ucl.ac.uk/mjh/covid19/#rates Consider how now is almost three weeks from the initial (more "light") lockdown, so we are now seeing the effects of that one, the "new" (tighter) lockdown was only 5 days ago (and actually fully effective only since 2 days) so we'll need another full week at least, very likely two, to start seeing the effects of the latter.

What I would try first (it should cost nothing or next to nothing) would be: 1) Uninstall the driver 2) modify the .inf REMming all Registry HKLM entries (i.e. open the source .inf and replace "<CR+LF>HKLM" with "<CR+LF>;HKLM" or, if you prefer, place a semicolon in front of any line that starts with HKLM) 3) Reinstall the driver This should remove all Winlogon, Autostart, etc. entries for the non-strictly-the-driver files. Will it work? No idea , but if it does it is quick (and dirty ). jaclaz

Maybe there is a way to only load/install the basic driver without the AMD "utilities" and the *whatever* that adds tabs to the display control panel. jaclaz

Possibly of use: jaclaz

Yep, this is what Tripredacus and I tried telling you since the start, possiby we were not clear enough, you need a device inserted/connected BEFORE attempting to change boot order and/or choosing device via F12. jaclaz

Ow, come on, what's in a name? Wouldn't a huge pile of manure smell as sweet by any other name? jaclaz

It greatly depends on the expert, Armand Gracious (JFYI): https://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/experts.html jaclaz

Good. I love it when a plan comes together. jaclaz

No, you are intending "wrong". Who cares if it is newer? Hint: once you manage (hopefully) to boot in AHCI/SATA mode, you will reasonably be able to update the AHCI/SATA driver. Do follow the given advice first: https://msfn.org/board/topic/181337-cannot-set-new-boot-option-in-bios/?do=findComment&comment=1179280 that one is JUST the AHCI/SATA driver AND seemingly it is in a format compatible with driverinjection tool. jaclaz

Look, I am trying (with some difficulty) to understand what you have done from the (scarce) feedback you provide. Where we are (according to my understanding of your reports): 1) you installed a bunch of drivers from IN1VDO11WW1.exe 2) the IN1VDO11WW1.exe contains BOTH a "plain" driver \\Packages\Drivers\SBDrv\hseries\MINI_IDE\XP\, from now on AmdIde.sys, AND: 3) a "RAID" (actually also AHCI) driver \\Packages\Drivers\SBDrv\hseries\RAID\, from now on ahcix86.sys 4) I suspected that what you have installed, together with the bunch of drivers in #1 is the Amdide.sys (since you installed it in IDE mode) AND: 5) suggested you to try using the driverinjection to try installing the Ahcix86,sys 6) RainyShadow suggested (correctly) to try installing instead the ahcix86.sys that is in the file IN1AHC20WW1.exe 7) You failed to report whether you actually followed the suggestion in #6 and went astray with uninstalling VBEMP (hey. look. that is a squirrel ) So the questions remain: a. Did you actually follow RainyShadow's suggestion (per #6 above)? b. If yes, what happened? c. If not, what are you waiting for? If you actually did follow RainyShadow's suggestion (per #6 above) AND upon reboot AND with BIOS set as AHCI you still get a 0x0000007b, then we can move on from this with further troubleshooting steps, namely comparing what you now have in the Registry with the information in the .reg file here: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_xp-hardware/how-do-i-change-widows-xp-from-ide-mode-to-ahci/7819a905-cfd9-4966-b2aa-67afc80a31d8?page=8 (post by D J Roff) jaclaz

More like : jaclaz

It is the "assuming it's on the system" assumption that is - at the moment - only an assumption. Did you actually install the driver RainyShadow pointed you to? jaclaz

Yep. If you have a "spare" USB stick, you could use Rufus to make it surely UEFI bootable. https://rufus.ie/ It doesn't really matter *which* payload you use, you can try the SuperGrub2: https://www.supergrubdisk.org/category/download/supergrub2diskdownload/super-grub2-disk-stable/ https://sourceforge.net/projects/supergrub2/files/2.04s1/super_grub2_disk_2.04s1/super_grub2_disk_hybrid_2.04s1.iso/download which is small and simple and *universal*. Right now we don't know if the issue is the format of the *whatever* device you tried till now or *something else*, so we need to test with a surely UEFI compatible/bootable device to see if it makes a difference (it is a rare occasion, but it is possible that it could be a *random* firmware/NVRAM issue). jaclaz

Good , the support page is here: https://www.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/support-product/7624?b=1&pn=DT.BAPAA.006 Bad , the user manual is EITHER a dumb user manual OR a manual for dumb user as it contains NO meaninfgul information on the BIOS/UEFI settings. Side note: the page lists 4 different BIOS updates, last one march 09 2020, so maybe it is to be evaluated the opportunity to update your BIOS . Watch this (starting from around 1:40), it is about an Acer (though a model with Insyde firmware as opposed to the AMI one you have) to further understand how it is vital to know if the device is actually UEFI bootable: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IU0b48XpNsU Then watch this one (about a Toshiba BUT with an AMI firmware that should be similar to yours): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8Ml1IbVp-8 to see how you could try experimenting. jaclaz

Open IN1VDO11WW1.exe the with 7-zip. Get to IN1VDO11WW1.exe\\Packages\Drivers\SBDrv\hseries\MINI_IDE\XP\ Read ReadMe.rtf. In theory that should install the driver for both PATA (or IDE) and SATA mode, but it depends on the actual controller. Maybe you already have them installed : Very likely you need to get INSTEAD to: IN1VDO11WW1.exe\\Packages\Drivers\SBDrv\hseries\RAID\XP\ then loop to: https://msfn.org/board/topic/181337-cannot-set-new-boot-option-in-bios/?do=findComment&comment=1179143 BUT BEFORE that make sure that your hardware PCI VEN/DEV is among the ones in ahcix86.inf: jaclaz

Basically: 1) "Old" BIOS (or CSM) method: boot priority is "per device", the actual boot mechanism implies that the device first sector (or sector 16 for CD/DVD optical media) is chainloaded, i.e. *whatever* code (if any) there is executed[1], if it is good then it boots, if it is not good either halts or tries the next device in boot priority 2) "New" UEFI method: boot priority is still "per device" but only nominally as the device (the filesystem on the device) is accessed and ONLY IF a valid UEFI/EFI bootloader is found THEN the device is "valid" and the bootloader is chainloaded, otherwise the device is "skipped" The F12 menu is not entirely different, on BIOS the list of available device is always populated by ALL the devices (that are "hardcoded" in the actual BIOS/firmware) while on UEFI (but it may depend on specific implementations) the list is populated ONLY by devices which filesystem actually contain a valid bootloader. In other words, your CD/DVD or USB stick may well be normally bootable on BIOS/CSM but if it is not ALSO UEFI bootable it won't likely be added to the F12 list. To make things worse (if possible) in some implementations (not necessarily your specific one) the booting options are recorded in NVRAM and - for *whatever* reasons - it may also happen that the NVRAM becomes "locked" (i.e. Read Only) and it is not possible to update it without first resetting the firmware. Having "Secure Boot" on may (or may not) further limit the bootable status of a device (again it depends on the specific UEFI/EFI firmware implementation). Post the EXACT model of your Acer Aspire computer, maybe having a look at its manual it is possible to understand how it should behave. jaclaz [1] generally speaking, in some cases - looking at you Insyde BIOS - the actual boot code is actually checked (wrongly) and in some cases it won't boot even if the code is just fine.

Maybe not your case, but it is possible that the priority only "kicks in" if a valid device is found, i.e. are you really sure that the USB stick you tried is bootable (or the CD/DVD) with the current settings? That behaviour seems to be connected with UEFI firmware. If this is the case you can try switching (temporarily) to CSM. Post (EXACT) model and (EXACT) version of windows you are now running. jaclaz

I would say that it is about right now the moment to take some time to image the disk "as is" before attempting further modifications. At the very least do make a copy/backup of the Registry or create a Restore Point. Maybe it won't be needed, but better safe than sorry. jaclaz P.S.: Yep, everything is more or less fine around me, I am not in the North where the situation is really dramatic, I live in the center where the numbers of positive cases are (at least till now) relatively low.

NO, as per your link, there can be MANY reasons, AMONG them the UPX packing. I stand by my "*whatever* reasons", which - while more vague - remains more accurate. jaclaz

Hmmm. It is likely (but not necessarily true) that the 0x0000007E comes from IntelPPM service and its Start value. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SYSTEM \ ControlSet001 \ Services \ Intelppm On a normal (Intel) install it is set to 1 (System). On a "universal" image it is is usually set to 3 (On demand) BUT there have been reports that on AMD Notebooks BUT NOT on AMD desktops it needs to be set to 4 (Disabled). See: http://reboot.pro/topic/13893-bsod-0x0000007e-while-booting-img-on-amd/ You have nothing to lose checking it and if not already 4 set it to 4. jaclaz

Yep, the Windows (Vista and later) environment (Setup) that boots from DVD (or mapped iso image) is a PE. There may be different implementations in the sense that the Shift+F10 to open a command prompt might work on first screen, though it has been reported that in some cases you need to get to the second one: https://www.rmprepusb.com/tutorials/winiso#top Then, you will have ANOTHER issue if you want to install the Windows 7 to the 7.img. Just as you won't see from the PE (Setup) the 7.iso until you will have it mapped with IMDISK, you won't see the 7.img until you will have mapped it with a suitable driver (Imdisk won't likely work[1] for this and you will need either Firadisk or WinvBlock or similar). http://reboot.pro/topic/13738-win7vblock/ jaclaz [1] it has to be seen, IMdisk does not connect to the mount manager, but since your image is already partitioned with a volume already formatted it may work

So, everything is good. Only as a side note, this approach to input checking is not exactly "correct": I mean, what happens if I input "T" by mistake? Usually you "force" a negative result for all input BUT the one you check for that would change the result, *like* jaclaz

The working code is in the two links on rmprepusb.com, as said it is not only a matter of the grub4dos menu entries, as you need a windows driver to re-,mount the cd/dvd. You can anyway use the menu entries there and do the mounting manually, pressing Shift+F10 when booted in the PE and running the .cmd from the command line prompt. https://www.rmprepusb.com/tutorials/winiso#top The Winiso.zip containing the imdisk driver and the batches you can get from here: https://www.rmprepusb.com/documents/rmprepusb-beta-versions/WINISO.zip?attredirects=0&d=1 but as well you can install Imdisk and mount the iso manually. Though there may be new approaches, that one has always worked. jaclaz