PLEASE HELP!!! I have spent over 10 hours trying

X:\sources> comes up

and i type chkdsk/f

but it says,

The type of the file system is NTFS.
Cannot lock current drive.
Windows cannot run disk checking on this volume because it is write protected

i tried again without the /f and this time a long list of things is spit out with "Windows has checked the file system and found no problems" at the end

OK the hard drive is clean.

Suggest you focus on getting that AHCI to work, inserting AHCI driver you found on CD into installer at Custom screen, whether that is sufficient for SATA controller.

Maybe someone can answer why your board had defaulted to IDE. Was that because AHCI driver needed to be installed first? Does it replace SATA drivers which are not found so far for that board, or on its downloads page? Would installer have had IDE emulation drivers or was that a bogus setting since you have SATA drives?

I asked SIW2 to look at this as it needs higher expertise, or deeper Googling.

The drive setting is AHCI already. I tried installing with the AHCI drivers installed, but the same thing happened, except for one time when the expanding reached 93% and adifferent error occurred:

0xc0000005 Windows installation encountered an unexpected error. Verify that the installation sources are accessible, and restart the installation

If Vista install is experiencing the same fail (or similar), and it's not BIOS settings, how about Memory.

Try install with one then the other gigstick.

Have you tested it with memtest bootable CD? I'd run it overnight tonight.

i will try that tonight. thank you for your suggestions. I have school during the week so I probably won't be able to work on it again until next weekend.

Once again. Thanks.

Do you think that it's the BIOS???? Perhaps a BIOS Update?

I was just thinking about that. Those additional BIOS Updates listed on Downloads page came fast and furious since August, so they might well have to do with these install issues

http://www.asrock.com/MB/download.as...5M%20Pro&o=All

You need to find out first if they are cumulative, as some BIOS updates are, or if you have to install them all sequentially. I would also want a way to recover from failure.

Can you question your mobo tech support about this? I always use phone tech support (to call back until I get answer), but you might want to chat or send them an e-mail with the relevant questions since you need to spread this out during school week.

will do.

yea skylinepigeon, looks like our problems are very similar.