wpeinit fail

Just went to install windows 7 on my wifes gateway laptop. Its apprx 1 year old. It has vista 64 bit on it, and I am installing 64 bit 7.

everything went fine, up to the first restart. It shows the windows logo... then goes to a blank desktopesque screen with a administrator command prompt.

it shows x:\$windows.~bt\windows\system32>wpeinit

then just sits there... until it pops up with
x:\$windows.~bt\windows\system32>

then nothing at all. have tried turning on/off computer... removing cd, putting cd back in.. absolutely nothing.

any help would be appreciated!




comp stats:
gateway fx laptop
4gb ddr3
512mb 9800GT nvidia
8800 dual core (apprx)
~200gb harddrive

did a search earlier on wpeinit and it found nothing.

am now trying a clean install, booted from cd through bootmenu. hopefully this fixes it

install went MUCH smoother/faster this time around (didnt do the upgrade choice though).

Of course... now my wife (its her laptop) is mad at me cuz she doesnt have any programs on her computer anymore haha

also having the same problem. Trying to upgrade from vista ultimate 64-bit on an acer aspire 8920 laptop. During initial reboot, i get a windows prompt screen with the same error the above poster is receiving. Any ideas on how to fix this problem without doing a clean install?