I have now been reading about this stuff for about a week. I have learned enough to be thoroughly confused. I first went to Sony and downloaded the drivers for my chipset (Intel 945 Express). That came with an EXE file that I could not unpack because it searches to see if it's being unpacked on a Sony computer, and since my Sony is messed up right now (hence the need to install this OS), I have it on my toshiba laptop - and the extraction of the EXE fails. So, I got the INF files from the intel website - great thanks to those that helped find those when I asked that question. That has a folder titled ALL with bunches of INF files. I tried to slipstream those INF files into $OEM$, $$, $1, etc with no luck. The SATA drive is still invisible.
TODAY - I got to BestBuy and get a USB floppy drive and some diskettes (why not spend the money on something I'll hardly ever again unless I'm fixing friend's PCs or building my own in the future - Sick of the way SONY does stuff and it seems DELL isn't much better). So I have the INF files on the floppy. Now the WINDOWS text install can't see the floppy. So I read more and determine that it seems I need to add the driver of the USB Floppy to the txtsetup file on my CD so that it will load and then i can hit F6 and install the drivers.
Well, It seems like I am supposed to have more files than just the Setup Info and Security Catalog files. And none of the downloads I found came with a txtsetup file. I have since searched the folder where I unpacked the XP Pro CD (in order to slipstream the drivers) and found the .SIF files. There is a txtsetup.sif file there. My question is that everyone seems to know what the .oem file is, how to write it, or it's provided somewhere in a download, because I have not found one yet and just found a link to one that is customized for a different computer and I've not seen/learned enough to customize it for my own uses.
As for finding the information about the Floppy to include it in a text file so its drivers will load (assuming I figure out how) I went to the Device Manager and found it's Hardward ID. This is exactly what I found (yes the entire list of these was there):
USBSTOR\SFloppyY-E_DATAUSB
-FDU______
__7.03
USBSTOR\SFloppyY-E_DATAUSB
-FDU______
__
USBSTOR\SFloppyY-E_DATA
USBSTOR\Y-E_DATAUSB-FDU___
______7
USBSTOR\GENSFloppy
GenSFloppy
I honestly have no idea what to think of these. They are nothing like what I found in the example txtsetup.oem file found at this link:
http://www.msfn.org/board/Using-a-F6-Driver-with-USB-Floppy-t82711.html. The floppy drives referenced there looked like this:
id = "USB\VID_03F0&PID_2001", "usbstor" #--HP
id = "USB\VID_054C&PID_002C", "usbstor" #--Sony
id = "USB\VID_057B&PID_0001", "usbstor" #--Y-E Data
id = "USB\VID_0409&PID_0040", "usbstor" #--NEC
id = "USB\VID_0424&PID_0FDC", "usbstor" #--SMSC
id = "USB\VID_08BD&PID_1100", "usbstor" #--Iomega
id = "USB\VID_055D&PID_2020", "usbstor" #--Samsung
I hate asking for step-by-step instructions, so I won't. I would like someone to look at the steps I've been doing and tell me where I need to add something or I am doing something wrong. Some kind of guidance would be great!!! (And worth 500 points).
1. Unpacked the Windows XP Pro CD from the CD ROM into a folder on my computer.
2. Downloaded the SATA drivers from Intel's website and selected the 945 drivers for my chipset. (I could not use SONY because there were not INF files in the download and I could not extract/install the EXE file to get the INF files from the install location.)
HERE IS WHERE I HAVE DIVERGED INTO 2 DIFFERENT APPROACHES - 1) SLIPSTREAM 2) FLOPPY INSTALL
3. Use nLiteOS (
www.nliteos.com) to slipstream the drivers into the XP Pro Installation CD from the downloaded files from the Intel website.
4. Attempt to load the newly burned ISO file from nLite to my Sony VAIO computer and get no change.
AS THE FLOPPY ATTEMPT
3. Load the INF files to the floppy drive. Plug the floppy drive into my SONY VAIO.
4. Pop in the XP PRo install CD and reboot the computer.
5. Hit F6 when necessary to go into the 3rd party driver installation mode.
6. Get really frustrated when I receive the error message that the floppy drive was not found. As Calvin in Calvin & Hobbes would say "Aaaarrrrrrggggggghhhhh!!!
!!!"
My fingers are tired from typing this. I hope someone can help me out. I'm sick of only knowing enough to be confusing and confused. Thanks for all of the help. If more than one person is very helpful, I'll ask a separate, but similar question so each can get the 500 points.
Jarod
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