Problems installing XP MCE 2005

[Tripredacus]

Hey I am having problems doing an OEM install of XP Media Center 2005.

I first started out by installing the software. After install was complete we went into Windows to install the 3rd disc, which is a "service pack" from Microsoft. We got errors such as:

"This application has failed to start because SRCLIENT.dll was not found" and we were also unable to view the event viewer. IPConfig showed us a NIC with no IP but Network Connections was blank.

I did some research and found that MCE will sometimes not install properly. So I did a repair install.

Now it boots up with the 0x7e / access denied stop error.

The Microsoft site has a hotfix for Server 2003 (it won't install on mce) and the XP articles say it is a problem with drivers (there are none loaded).

Should I do a format and reinstall of MCE again or what? This is the first time I've had to install this software, and the first time my company has gotten an order for it.

PS: At this time I can get to Safe Mode only.

[Idontwantspam]

I'd say that a full reinstall would be a good idea, seeing as though there's no data you need to keep on the computer if you just tried an install and it failed.

[PC_LOAD_LETTER]

consider me vote #2 for a full reinstall. id advise to skip the CD3 install though and go straight to MS Update for your patches.

[Tripredacus]

consider me vote #2 for a full reinstall. id advise to skip the CD3 install though and go straight to MS Update for your patches.

OK I will try that next. I tried the 2CD install before. We never got to the third CD because it wouldn't run.

[Tripredacus]

Hmm, yes third times the charm it appears. I didn't have to install the 3rd CD anyways because the OS isn't going to be activated by us. We don't do updates on machines that the customer has to activate or the WGA will lock us out.

It said it needed .net 1.1 to install CD3 anyways so I just skipped it.