My first time! i'm scared. tell me what you think...

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J

JTBALLER

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Aug 18, 2009
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APPROXIMATE PURCHASE DATE: would like to buy the parts today BUDGET RANGE: would be happy to keep it under 1,000. but 1,200 would still be fine.

SYSTEM USAGE FROM MOST TO LEAST IMPORTANT: gaming, internet, hdmi port for movies

PARTS NOT REQUIRED: have keyboard and mouse, that's about it

PREFERRED WEBSITE(S) FOR PARTS: newegg or any other sites that are respected

PARTS PREFERENCES: i want to use the intel core i7 920, because i've read that it's very good.

OVERCLOCKING: don't know much about overclocking so not right now

MONITOR RESOLUTION:1920x1200 i believe

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: nothing right now...

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Parts I've picked out: well i've only ended up coming up with a CPU i guess right now as i'm not too knowledgeable about videocards, soooo....

Intel core i7 920

picked this case, because i thought it was cool

I wanted to have an HDMI port also, so for that I would need to have a motherboard that has one, right? and then also for that HDMI, do I have to look for a videocard that can support HDMI?

well, for the motherboard and the videocard, i'd love to have suggestions from you guys, because I don't know which cards are good and which are not, and what is the best for the price, etc.

well, i guess this is a start... any opinions?
 
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well, i had to wait a few weeks to finally finish building because I couldn't find the graphics card.

But, now I have it all together and I can't get windows 7 to load 🙁

ominous prime do you know what i should do?

first of all, it takes like 10 minutes just to get to the "Where do you want to install windows?" screen, so i'm wondering if maybe the ram or something is wrong? But it looks to be installed right.

But the main thing, I can't get past that "where do you want to install windows screen?"! it gives me no choice or anything and says i need to load drivers but i dont know where to get them from. i try to load them from the motherboard disk, but it just doesn't work 🙁
 
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The system is posting, then when you're trying to install windows it isn't giving you an option to install to your hard drives? I'd recheck the connections, check in bios to make sure it's being recognized as well.

Where does it say you need to load drivers? That seems quite peculiar to me, you shouldn't need to load drivers until after the install.
 
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Yes, the dvd rom and the hard drive show up in bios.

Windows 7 loads up to the "setup is starting" screen and takes about 5-10 minutes and it gets to "Where do you want to install windows?" screen. But there is no place to choose to install it to. Then I have the options of loading drivers, so I tried with my motherboard disk and they won't work, it says they are unsigned.

I'm so lost. I've been searching the internet for the past 8 hours 🙁
 
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I did some googling for you. I've never encountered a problem like this, I read that perhaps switching out the sata cable can do the trick.

But I also read that Windows has trouble installing to drives of 1tb and greater, are you using a 1tb drive as your main drive?
 
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yes it's a 1TB drive.

i've been googling too, usually when i do there are other people with the same problems and I can find an answer, but not with this.

also I don't know if it means anything, but i tried installing windows xp reinstallation cd from an old dell laptop and it saw the hard drive and got to the format so I chose to do that, and it took about 3 hours. then it said there was an error. so then i tried again with quick format and the same thing happened.

i don't know but thought perhaps this could mean the hard drive is messed up? but unlikely I guess because it's brand new?

could it be something with the windows 7 disc perhaps? lol i'm sooo lost and frustrated
 
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It could be the hard drive, could you perhaps put it in your other computer (from your previous post it's a 1tb WD, correct?) and run the WD diagnostic tool.

Also, did you burn the disc, or did you order the OEM or retail from newegg?
 
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i ordered the disc from newegg, would i be able to return it for a replacement you think?

and my other computer is just a laptop... i don't know really how i could test the hard drive... and yes it's the 1TB WD

sheesh why doesn't anything ever go smoothly? haha


i really don't see how it could be anything that i did in the building process. i mean, if it were anything like that, it wouldn't even get to the windows setup screen, right?
 
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I don't think you would be able to return the disc, and that isn't likely to be the problem since it's a legit copy that you didn't burn.

I guess you wouldn't be able to test it on a laptop without the proper connections.

I imagine you did everything correctly, since it is posting. I have a WD 1tb black, I'll put in my copy of windows 7 and see if it recognizes, I think it did, but I'll double check. I installed the OS on a Samsung Spinpoint f3 500gb.

Have you rechecked the cables to the drive? And have you tried replacing the SATA data cable to the hard drive? Also check the power connections.

You may need to go to your motherboards website and download drivers or flash the bios.

And have you tried connecting the HDD to a different sata port?

Oh and **never remove anything while the computer is powered on** I'm sure you know this, but..just in case.
 
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Hey man you're awesome, thanks for your help.

One thing I haven't tried yet is using another data cable. I did however use the one already connected and move it to different sata ports on the motherboard, and it shows up in different spots in the bios but still does nothing for the win 7 installation process.

And also, I did download the drivers, but had just began reading about the flash the bios.

I have to take a few hours off though, before i go insane haha. Going to take a little break and then try another cable and read up about how to flash the bios and see what happens. thanks again tho for your help :)

and yeah, i've been close a few times to just reaching in and yanking out a cable here or there but then I remember to make sure to turn it off first haha.
 
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Glad I can help, just hope we can get this running without an RMA and that it isn't a malfunctioning component causing the problems. Breaks are good when frustration occurs lol, I remember the first time I built a computer I got a dead motherboard. Took me hours to figure out which component was bad.

Well I hope another cable will do the trick, it worked in some cases that I read, but I'm more concerned that a format failed in Windows xp setup. That makes me think it could be a bad hard drive.

Hopefully others will chime in with their opinions as well.
 
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don't worry kasceis, i run into some of the strangest things with computers. i had a dell 5150 that had some crazy problem that turned into a recall but gave me a huge headache forever. things like this happens to me all the time, and it sucks haha. i'm sure yours will go fine.

i'm gonna go back to it tomorrow, i'm going to relax the rest of the night and watch some basketball :) i'll let ya know tho
 
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apparently when I formatted the drive it changed something and now when i try to install windows 7 I can't even get to the point where it asks where to install.

now i get this message:

Windows installation encountered an unexpected error. Verify that the installation sources are accessible, and restart the installation. Error code:0xE0000100

gah. well, i might just end up taking this to a place for some professional to look at it. i'm just about fed up at this point 🙁
 
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A quick google of the error code makes it look like Windows is not recognizing the partition. The format errored out in Windows XP, so perhaps the drive is not properly formatted.

You tried swapping sata data cables and checked the power connections?

Also, you tried formatting with NTFS, correct?

I'd start a new thread with a title explicitly stating your problem, others will be more likely to chime in then.
 
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