Thank you so much for your speedy and detailed reply, Fernando. It looks like I misunderstood that part of your tutorial. I had thought IDE Mode would be required if XP was to install at all, regardless of integrated drivers. I have since built a custom disc using your instructions and nLite and it worked perfectly. I always tell my friends when doing major maintenance on their computers like this "There's always one snag that comes up where I have to go and do research before it can be fixed". Thankfully, this one happened early on and I truly appreciate the assistance. The .SYS files are the real drivers, the .INF files are text files, which contain the instructions about how to get the driver installed and working, the .DLL files are just co-installer files. Don't worry about the fact, that nLite will just show the INF file while integrating the driver. It will copy all files of the driver folder onto the XP CD. The problem was I couldn't find the INF files at all. I traced the drivers by using the Device Manager to show me the filepath where they were located (C:\Windows\System32\Drivers for the most part) and they were all in SYS and DLL. How would I go about tracking down the corresponding INF files, just so I know for the future? You will find the needed 32bit driver within my guide (first post of this thread). The drivers I have uploaded are the newest and currently best Intel SATA drivers and will fully support the Compac laptop of your friend.They did, I commend you for your dilligence. Don't try to do that. Since the laptop of your friend does support the advanced features of AHCI (NCQ and hot plugging) and the installation of Windows XP with integrated Intel AHCI driver will easily be done, why should he run XP without AHCI support?This was an extention of my previous misunderstanding where I thought the hard disc's mode *had* to be changed in order for XP to be installed. Generally I prefer working with a more advanced BIOS regardless, it gives greater flexibility if you want to fine-tune the system. As it was not a relevant factor in this particular case, however, I'll leave it be. Thank you again.