Thanks Slinkie... My system is still down so my email is round about my wife's laptop. I can't write to any files because the install never quite completes. When XP should start, I get 'can't find AUTOCHK' and then going on without it and blue screen. I've made two install disks sincemy last post w/o unattended install and nothing significant removed from the OS, but it still hangs up when the install looks complete and XP should start. I'm installing to a IBM 600x laptop that's been running XPpro for years w/o problems. The original XPpro install disk installs w/o problem. I used nLite on another XPpro disk a couple years ago and it worked very well. Someone told me that AUTOCHK.EXE is probably in it's correct place, but the OS doesn't find it because something has caused the HD to be hidden. I've used the recovery console to repair the boot sector, but no joy there either. Truthfully, I'm out of my depth at this level, but I could understand an explanation and follow directions. Thanks for your help. 73