The Road to XP

So, I started again, only this time I was armed with an XP Pro Full Install CD. Ha! Take that Windows! And here lies my fatal flaw, I assumed that I had the upper-hand on Windows. Never assume that you have the upper hand, because you never do. But first, some details on the hardware we are working with.

• iWill KK266 motherboard (with latest BIOS from iWill)
• AMD Athlon 1.33 GHz CPU
• 382M RAM
• 40G HDD
• GeForce2 32M video card

I could boot from the XP Pro CD, but as soon as the install process got to the spiffy graphical section, it would die. Doing google searches for generic PC hardware isn't likely to get you any real answers, but rather a ton of reviews. I'm an Apple guy, so I don't know the best PC problem-solving sites. I asked some friends for help. They didn't give me a plan with actionable items, but rather a laundry list. I wanted a comprehensive plan to eleminate the problem and finish the upgrade. Some of their suggestions:

• Upgrade motherboard BIOS (already did)
• Take out all PCI cards (only 1 card, a 10/100 NIC -- but I took it out anyway)
• Various BIOS settings (tried as many as I could find in the menus)

So after all of this, I was fairly confident that it was an issue with the XP Pro installer and my video card. So I called up a local hole-in-the-wall PC parts shop because I know the brother of the owner. The message on the answering machine informed me that they were closed not only Friday, but Saturday as well in order to observe the death of former President Reagan. Two days? Whatever.

So after doing my best to patronize local merchants I headed off to Best Buy, whom I hate to patronize but do when my impatience gets the best of me. Dealing with Windows always tries my patience and as you can clearly tell, this was no exception. I purchase a GeForce MX 4000 and head out the door. I follow the instructions about removing the drivers for the current card before I stick the new card in. Then the new card goes in, I hit the power and nothing. Well, almost nothing, I get a nasty beep out of the PC speaker. I cursed myself for ever thinking that I had the upper-hand.

I now had to make a choice, take the card back to Best Buy or give tech support a shot. My patience was making a comeback. I called the tech support number and gave a ton of information to a nice fellow who promptly shoved me into another phone queue for real support. I finally get through and only have to give half as much information as I did to the last fellow. I run through all the trouble shooting I had tried, BIOS settings, old card, and even the nasty beep. "Is it a dead card," I ask. He thought it might be dead and we get and RMA ready for me. "Can I just take it bacck to Best Buy," I queried. "That would be a lot faster."

One more time to Best Buy it was. When I got to the returns counter I gave them the short version and suggested they might throw the ccard in a machine real quick to see if it was dead, because if it wasn't dead and there was something really wrong with my computer, taking a new card of the same type would not really do anything except get them two open box returns. The blue shirt looked at me with a funny look and went back to check on the idea. She returned and informed me it would take about 45 minutes. Since I was only doing this as a favor to them, I opted not to wait and take a replacement card. Lesson learned: Don't bother trying to help out a large company, they don't give a crap.

Home I trudge with a new card and an impending sense of doom. I keep rummaging around in my brain for possible explanations as to why this is such a nightmare. I head back into the office and started the video card installation process all over again. Well, I didn't have to remove any drivers this time. I slam the card in the AGP slot, plug in the cable, hit the power, and cringed while I waited for the nasty error beep. But this time it worked. It really was a dead video card. But now, the question was if the XP Pro installer would work. I booted off the CD and let it take over again. The installer came up without a problem and then it was off to the races.

Fifty-one minutes later it was time to reboot. The first thing I did was fire up Windows Update to see how out of date I was. There were only 50 Critical Updates, mainly because Service Pack 1a wasn't installed. I installed that and got down to 19 Critical Updates. Now that's progress!

Everytime I deal with Windows or generic PC hardware at any level of detail it reminds me why I'm an Apple guy. This isn't to say that my Apple stuff is perfect, never breaks or never gives my any grief. It does, just not on this level and when I deal with it I feel like I do have the upper-hand.

Update: Part II -- Electric BIOS-aboo