Stuck at "Setup is loading System Devices"

Thanks for the welcome, and thanks for the reply!

By 'offical DVD' do you mean MS DVD or MS ISO file burned to DVD?
It is an actual Windows 7 Home Premium x64 Upgrade MS DVD.

Are you using the Clean install or Upgrade method?
Clean Install on a new HD, which is the only one in the system.

What mother board are you using?
Asus P6T Deluxe

Try with one of the other RAM modules. Have you done a memtest?
All the RAM modules are identical, and trying a different one had no effect.

Do you have on board graphics? Try installing with that if possible.
Try with VGA cable if possible.
Unfortunately my card only has DVI and S-Video outputs. Tried both with no success. I have no onboard graphics card, but I've tried an older Nvidia 8800GT with same problem. (DVI / S-Video only also)

Have you checked for updated BIOS version?
Not yet, I will look into that after trying accessing the device manager via safemode as posted in this other thread: Device Manager - Access During Windows 7 Installation

Any Over Clocking of the RAM, CPU or GPU?
No.

Updates on my situation.

I have tried swapping memory modules, and running memory diagnostics. Memory is fine, swapping does nothing.

I have upgraded my BIOS to the latest version, no luck.

I have also accessed the device manager via the safe mode command prompt, tried disabling my video card and other devices, still no luck.

Running out of things to try... Anybody with any suggestions please let me know. Thanks!

No second monitor or TV hooked up. Tried it with a second monitor hooked up just to see if it made a difference, it did not.

I've been running through BIOS settings a lot, with little else to try... Nothing is overclocked, disabled all unnessecary onboard hardware, and BIOS is most recent version.

No floppy drive in this system, used a USB stick when I flashed the BIOS. Have 6GB (3 x 2GB) of Memory , but i'm only running with 1 x 2GB in.

Ah, overlooked the Floppy drive settings in the BIOS. Disabled it and took it out of the boot order. Reinstalled but still hanging on same spot, I'm out of ideas so I'll just let it sit, maybe like you said, it'll be okay after a few hours.

After about 10 minutes it says setup will continue after restarting. This is an endless loop.

LightningLdr180 said:

After about 10 minutes it says setup will continue after restarting. This is an endless loop.

I empathise - that sounds like a complex issue and you've done some great troubleshooting already. Have rep.

Personally, I'd try to get to the setup log files in order to check whether there's anything useful being logged. Here's a list of logfiles and the specific phase of installation where each one is recorded:

Windows Vista setup log file locations

The article references Vista but that doesn't matter in this instance - the info should be identical or very similar for Win7. It's probably best to start off by checking setupact.log and setuperr.log. There may be clues in there as to why the installation is looping.