Hirudin

It sounds like you're doing a fresh install? Are you getting this message when you're asked into what drive to install Vista? To me (from what you've said so far) Vista doesn't think whatever drive you're installing into is a boot device. If you only have the single HDD this doesn't make any sense... Do you have any flash drives or external drives?

Sorry for taking so long to post the answers to my own questions. I am now talking from experience... 1. They only send you a new disc, in a plain white sleeve. No new key. It's odd that the Microsoft CSR (after putting me on hold to verify the answer to this question) was actually incorrect... 1b. N/A 2. It appears so (from what others have said) and from my own experience. I used the key from my 32 bit packaging to activate my 64 bit Windows. 3. It seems that other people are saying that OEM keys will activate either version. I was under the impression MS wont let you order a 64 bit disc if you mistakingly order a 32 bit OEM. Q5. Has anyone out there actually activated a 64 bit OEM install using a key from 32 bit OEM packaging? (or a 32 install using a 64 key) 4. No, it doesn't appear that I'll actually have to order another disc.

OK... Talked to MS again. Here's what they said this time... There's really only 1 bit that's different than the first time. 1. They send a disc and a key. 1b. They weren't sure about this <--- I'm still very curious about this, if anyone knows! 2. No, 32 bit needs a 32 bit key, 64 bit needs a 64 bit key. (This is different than what the first rep told me, but I think he may have been mistaken.) 3. OEM is not elijable for alternate media, at least not 64 bit. I forgot to get a specific answer for upgrades... 4. Yes. Since the key I will be getting is 32 bit only, I'll have to order a whole new disc and key for the other disc as well. Boo! 10 more bucks, more waiting... lame! Well, at least with the new keys I don't have to worry that the eBay seller copied them down before shipping to me...

I've receintly bought a few copies of Vista on eBay. One of them was a Business-Full-Retail version. I've received the disc but since I'd like to install the 64 bit version I've ordered a 64 bit disc from Microsoft. I had to enter my DVD Key to order the disc. I called Microsoft, they made it seem like the 64 bit disc would come with another key. I can only presume that the key I used to order the disc is now no longer valid... Have any of you ordered alternative media from Microsoft? 1. Do they just send a new disc, or do they send a new key as well? 1b. What form does the new key take? Is it a nice COA sticker like all copies of XP used to have, or is it a cheap, ugly, yellow sticker affixed to the packaging? In the same conversation with Microsoft they also made it seem like the key that I already have would work with either a 32 or 64 bit install. 2. Do all full-retail keys work with either 32 or 64 bit installs? 3. What about OEM keys and/or upgrade keys? The main reason I ask, is I have another disc/key coming (a Premium-Full-Retail). I'm going to use this license to install a 64 bit version on another computer. 4. Am I going to need to order a completely seperate 64 bit DVD and key for this as well, or can I just use the key included with the 32 bit packaging and use any 64 bit DVD for the install? Thanks to anyone who can help! By the way, I've searched around the forums and the net for definative answers to these questions but as of yet have been unable to find any. I think I'll call MS again, and ask another CSR. I'll post her/his responses here...

That's probably it. Sounds like you're trying to upgrade from XP to Vista using a "clean install" key. I think retail version keys will upgrade AND clean install, but OEM keys will only clean install...

I bet "the guide" to which people are referring is this. It says XP all over the place but most of the stuff works for 2k also.

I've got this to work in Windows 2000, I'd bet the you can make it work in XP. Here's a post I wrote that says what I did.

OK, I'm sorry if this has been discussed before, I was trying to find out how to do this and searched many times, I didn't find anything useful. Anyway, you can change the "transition effects" setting in the Display Properties -> Effects -> Visual Effects dialog box window thing. Also, I bet this could be used to change the other settings like: Smooth edges of screen fonts Use large icons Show icons using all possible colors Show window contents while dragging Hide keyboard navigation indicators until I use the Alt key (I have only tested with "transition effects" though.) I'm no expert, but this did work for me. I'm also sleepy, if this is incomprehensible lemme know and I'll try to fix it or something... I used a file comparison program to narrow the registry entry that controlls this setting down to the MinAnimate string in HKEY_USERS\<random numbers windows assigns to the current user>\Control Panel\Desktop\WindowMetrics 0 = NO transition effects 1 = USE transition effects The problem was, you can't create a registry key unless you know the random a** (or maybe not random) string of numbers Windows 2000 aparrently assigns to users. I figured out a sullution though: Change the .DEFAULT user, then when windows copies it to the new user account it'll be setup the way you want. The only way I could figure out to change the .DEFAULT account in time is to do it in the RunOnceEx.cmd file. Use REG.EXE to add any registry entries you want. Here's a very simple RunOnceEx.CMD file that will add this key: @echo off SET DFLT=HKU\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Desktop REG ADD "%DFLT%"\WindowMetrics /V MinAnimate /D 0 /f exit The quotation marks around %DFLT% are important, don't forget them. I've also turned off the "Getting Started With Windows 2000" window: @echo off SET DURO=HKU\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion REG ADD %DURO%\Explorer\tips /V Show /T REG_DWORD /D 00000000 /f exit I've also set a "Cleanup" cmd file to run immediately after the first login (The main reason to have "cleanup.cmd" run after the first login is so you can have it delete all the stupid shortcuts on your desktop and/or start menu like "Connect to the Internet.lnk") @echo off FOR %%i IN (D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z) DO IF EXIST %%i:\CD.txt SET CDROM=%%i: SET DURO=HKU\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion REG ADD %DURO%\Runonce /V Cleanup /D "%CDROM%\Install\CLEANUP.CMD" exit And here's everything that pertains to this from my RunOnceEx file: @echo off FOR %%i IN (D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z) DO IF EXIST %%i:\CD.txt SET CDROM=%%i: SET DURO=HKU\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion SET DFLT=HKU\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Desktop REG ADD %DURO%\Runonce /V Cleanup /D "%CDROM%\Install\CLEANUP.CMD" REG ADD %DURO%\Explorer\tips /V Show /T REG_DWORD /D 00000000 /f REG ADD "%DFLT%" /V UserPreferencesMask /T REG_BINARY /D b0200080 /f REG ADD "%DFLT%" /V SmoothScroll /T REG_DWORD /D 00000000 /f REG ADD "%DFLT%"\WindowMetrics /V MinAnimate /D 0 /f exit

[quote name='W2Kuser' date='Feb 11 2005, 08:16 AM']Distribution folder means install over network and not CD?? We must stil use ? * I386\$OEM$\TEXTMODE\ * I386\$OEM$\ [right][post="270350"][/post][/right][/quote] I hope I understand your question... When they say "distribution folders" they're talking about the $OEM$ directories. The $OEM$ folders are used to "distribute" other files. (I think so anyway)

(I tried to include many keywords to help searches.) Welp, I made it work, thanks mostly to this guide. I've successfully included the Via "8237 Integrated Serial ATA RAID controller" drivers in my Windows 2000 CD. I no longer need to hit F6, no more driver disk. The SATA controller is on my Abit KV7 motherboard and the HDD is a Maxtor Y120M0 (if it somehow matters). Here's what I did (as best as I can remember). [b]*[/b][b]Copied Files[/b][b]*[/b] I copied the following files to my [b]ROOT\I386\$OEM$[/b] and [b]ROOT\$OEM$\TEXTMODE[/b] folders: [b]TXTSETUP.OEM VIAMRAID.CAT VIAMRAID.INF VIAMRAID.SYS[/b] (After extracting the [url="http://www.viaarena.com/downloads/drivers/RAID/VIA_RAID_V410a.zip"]file downloaded off the Via Arena website[/url] the [b]txtsetup.oem[/b] file was in [b]EXTRACTION-ROOT\DriverDisk[/b] and [b]viamraid.cat[/b] , [b]viamraid.inf[/b] , and [b]viamraid.sys[/b] were in [b]EXTRACTION-ROOT\DriverDisk\RAID\Win2000[/b] .) [b]*[/b][b]Modified both TXTSETUP.OEM files[/b][b]*[/b] I also modified both [b]TXTSETUP.OEM[/b] files, I'm pretty sure this needed to be done... In the [b][disks][/b] section I replaced the path after the last " [b],[/b] " (comma) with " [b]\[/b] " (backslash). The original [disks] section looked like this: [quote][Disks]d1 = "VIA RAID Combo Driver Diskette", \RAID\winxp\VIAMRAID.SYS, [b]\RAID\winxp[/b] d2 = "VIA RAID Combo Driver Diskette", \RAID\win2000\VIAMRAID.SYS, [b]\RAID\win2000[/b] d3 = "VIA RAID Combo Driver Diskette", \RAID\Winnt40\VIAMRAID.SYS, [b]\RAID\Winnt40[/b] d4 = "VIA RAID Combo Driver Diskette", \RAID\2003ia32\VIAMRAID.SYS, [b]\RAID\2003ia32[/b] #d9 = "VIA RAID Combo Driver Diskette", \RAID\x64\VIAMRAID.SYS, [b]\RAID\x64[/b] d5 = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller Driver", \PIDE\winxp\viapdsk.sys, [b]\PIDE\winxp[/b] d6 = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller Driver", \PIDE\win2000\viapdsk.sys, [b]\PIDE\win2000[/b] d7 = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller Driver", \PIDE\winnt40\viapdsk.sys, [b]\PIDE\winnt40[/b] d8 = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller Driver", \PIDE\2003ia32\viapdsk.sys, [b]\PIDE\2003ia32[/b][/quote] Now the [disks] section looks like this: [quote][Disks]d1 = "VIA RAID Combo Driver Diskette", \RAID\winxp\VIAMRAID.SYS, [b]\[/b] d2 = "VIA RAID Combo Driver Diskette", \RAID\win2000\VIAMRAID.SYS, [b]\[/b] d3 = "VIA RAID Combo Driver Diskette", \RAID\Winnt40\VIAMRAID.SYS, [b]\[/b] d4 = "VIA RAID Combo Driver Diskette", \RAID\2003ia32\VIAMRAID.SYS, [b]\[/b] #d9 = "VIA RAID Combo Driver Diskette", \RAID\x64\VIAMRAID.SYS, [b]\[/b] d5 = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller Driver", \PIDE\winxp\viapdsk.sys, [b]\[/b] d6 = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller Driver", \PIDE\win2000\viapdsk.sys, [b]\[/b] d7 = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller Driver", \PIDE\winnt40\viapdsk.sys, [b]\[/b] d8 = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller Driver", \PIDE\2003ia32\viapdsk.sys, [b]\[/b][/quote] [b]*[/b][b]Modified the WINNT.SIF file[/b][b]*[/b] I added the following lines to the bottom of my WINNT.SIF file in my I386 directory. (Yes, it works without the driver filenames, at least in my case.) [quote][MassStorageDrivers][b]"VIA RAID Controller(Windows 2000)"[/b] = "OEM" "IDE CD-ROM (ATAPI 1.2)/PCI IDE Controller" = "RETAIL" [OEMBootFiles] TXTSETUP.OEM[/quote] BTW, I got the string: [b]"VIA RAID Controller(Windows 2000)"[/b] from this section of the txtsetup.oem file: [quote][scsi]VIARAID_MULTIPLE_2003IA32 = "VIA RAID Controller(Windows 2003 IA32)" VIARAID_MULTIPLE_XP = "VIA RAID Controller(Windows XP)" VIARAID_MULTIPLE_2K = [b]"VIA RAID Controller(Windows 2000)"[/b] VIARAID_MULTIPLE_NT = "VIA RAID Controller(Windows NT4)" #VIARAID_MULTIPLE_2003K864 = "VIA RAID Controller(Windows 2003 AMDx86-64)" VIAPDSK_VT4149_2003IA32 = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller(Windows 2003IA32)" VIAPDSK_VT4149_XP = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller(Windows XP)" VIAPDSK_VT4149_2K = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller(Windows 2000)" VIAPDSK_VT4149_NT = "VIA ATA/ATAPI Host Controller(Windows NT4)"[/quote] I think that's about it... (I'll check this thread periodicly for a couple weeks, so if you have any questions for me, ask them soon).

Thanks Bilou_Gateux

OK fine, thanks for pointing out line 8 on instructions. Do we need to download "filecase" from somewhere? Does it say so in the instrctions anywhere? (line 14 maybe?) C:\>filecase 'filecase' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file. INFS directory : WINDOWS2000 ... CALL :HF1 CALL :HF2 ... RD /S /Q INFS :HF1 ... :HF1EXTRACT ... FOR /F %%I IN (INF.TXT) DO COPY TEMP\UPDATE\%%I "INFS\%HF% %%I.INF" :HF2 ... :HF2EXTRACT ... FOR /F %%I IN (INF.TXT) DO COPY TEMP\%%I "INFS\%HF% %%I.INF" I can't say for sure, but it looks like the script takes all the infs, renames them, and puts them into the INFS folder. Then does nothing with them and deletes them. Are they suppose-to be moved into the i386 folder or something? Also IF "%DOIE%"=="YES" COPY /Y FIX\*.IN_ SOURCESS\I386 IF "%DOIE%"=="YES" COPY /Y FIX\IESETUP.DL_ SOURCESS\I386 IF EXIST FIX COPY /Y FIX\*.* SOURCESS\I386 Looks like it copies specific files out of FIX, then copies everything. If you ever look at this thread FDV, is there a chance you could tell us what postsp.inf does? Its got a lot of registry keys in there, what do they do? Is this necessary?

Thank you for the update! I think it'll make it a whole lot easier for people who just want to get it done without having to get a PhD in slipstreaming. Is this implemented in the new file (2/25)? So the new cmd file will automatically patch your install files so that WU knows that you've already installed the hotfixes?

I'm pretty sure you need to "repack" your DirectX. I followed the instructions here and it works fine (dxdiag runs without errors). ... If you use the above method you don't need any switches, you can edit them out of the cmd file or out of the SVCPACK.IN_(.cab) file after the script has run.

Sweet! Can't wait to give it A whirl.