Win7 32 bit won't get past "Starting Windows"

Thanks for the info guys. Seems strange to me though that I was able to install Win 7 RC on an even older MSI motherboard -- also with an AMD processor -- and this one with "ony" 768mb of ram. That system ran 7 RC fine.

I got tired of pulling my hair out and installed Ubuntu on the machine instead. It runs Ubuntu great, btw!

But since it has two 30gb and two 20 gb drives, I think I might try a dual-boot setup later with Win 7 on the other 30gb drive. I've got other fish to fry right now, and don't have the time to waste--er, spend -- on it right now.

I will ponder your advice and try it out once I've set up a boot manager.

Did you try these steps before quitting, or removing all but 2gb of RAM for install?

gregrocker said:

Where did you get Win7? Check HASH against official HASH. Burn another DVD using ImgBurn at 4x speed - it never fails.

Try running Win7 installer from XP to overwrite it.

Swap RAM sticks to reseat them.

Did you "wipe" partition or only format it? You need to use the "Wipe" choice from PW Disk tab to apply at least one set of zeroes to overwrite any possible conflicting or infected code.

Try installing WIn7 in the other machine, then swap HD into problem machine. It will frequently start up while swapping out all drivers, requesting several restarts. If not, try booting into safe mode to install chipset and video, sound drivers.

Do yourself a favor and install Win7 while Ubuntu HD is unplugged, then after install set preferred HD as first to boot in BIOS setup, boot the other HD using one-time BIOS Boot Menu key given on first screen or in Manual.

cooltouch said:

The title pretty much says it all with respect to what's happening right now. When I first started trying to install Win 7, I got a blue screen telling me to disable caching of memory in a few different devices, so I went into CMOS setup and disabled anything I could find related to memory cache. Well, this did away with the blue screen, but then I got another screen offering to check the system memory, which I did. Afterward, it came up to the Starting Windows screen, where the four blobs swirl around and then form the Windows logo -- and from that point nothing more occurred. Rebooted and this time there was no screen offering to check memory again. It just went straight to the logo and stopped. Most recently, I went back and re-enabled all the cache settings that I'd disabled. No more blue screen, but the machine continues to stop at the same point.

I think you may actually be the only other person on the planet besides me who has this problem, I managed to figure it out, but I've asked all kinds of HW-gurus as to why but with no luck. I also have AMD on that computer, got bluescreens at first during install, fiddled with ram chips and got to Starting Windows - but the Welcome screen never appeared so I figured I had a faulty ram chip as the errors were irradic. I then systematically used every possible combination of amount and positioning of the chips on the MB to find at least one working chip. The result however was ridiculous: suddenly windows said Welcome; with one chip in slot 1! .. reboot to check consistency, but NO...every time.. back to it then. I continued with 2 chips, slot 1+2 occupied: "Welcome"!.. reboot again, NO... "Starting Windows" forever on every try again. No change with slot 3 or 4 either so I pulled out all but slot 1, and suddenly it booted again! Nice, so I was sure it could do it twice but again it stopped every time on Starting... Put in slot 2 and it booted all the way again!

The only way to boot the machine every time was simply to add or remove memory each boot! Though only toggling slot 2, occupying 3 or 4 didn't work at all. By some utterly weird reason W7 denied booting with the same amount of ram twice, and only whatever I could put in slot 1+2. If I stuck to that, W7 booted nicely every single time ad ran stable weeks on end. I've run every conceivable hardware test, stress tests on ram/cpu - no problem. Infact I still use it like this since it's a box I almost never reboot or change configuration on...

The conclusion, and my suspicions that you have encountered something similar, is that even with 100% working hardware (XP/Vista used ram slot 3+4 nicely so I know they work), there are bizarre AMD/MB configurations that messes up W7's memory oversight. However the solution is simply to change the amount of physical ram on every reboot by removing and replacing the chip in slot 2 repeatedly... For me at least, but it's worth a try I guess.... Please post your progress either way if you reconsider W7.

gregrocker said:

Did you try these steps before quitting, or removing all but 2gb of RAM for install?

Indeed, the machine I have this problem on has 1+1GB now, more would loop the same error. Is this a known W7 feature?

Frequent cause of install failure. Remove all but 2gb of RAM for install.