HELP! Botched XP setup

[odie812]

Hey everyone,

It's been a day from hell...

I'm building a new PC:

Athlon XP 2600
Asus A7N8X Deluxe
512MB corsair XMS
2x 80 GB Seagate Barraccuda (Striped SATA RAID)
PNY Geforce FX 5200 Ultra
Samsung CDRW/DVD combo
Samsung floppy
XP Home

And it took me a couple hours before I figured out that I had to manually install the SATA drivers before I could install Windows XP (Was stuck on "Verifying DMI pool data"). So Windows install is giong fine, until it gets to where it says "8 minutes left" and those next 8 minutes take about an hour and a half. Whatever. That finishes and I reboot. I get a message that says:

stop C0000812: Registry File Failure
The registry cannot load the hive file:
systemroot/system32/config/software
or its log or alternate
it is corrupt, absent, or unwriteable

I tried to boot it up in recovery mode and I try microsoft's four-page long tutorial on fixing it, but it doesn't work.

I don't know what to do. I just want to start over. What is the best way for me to wipe everything out and try it again? Or better yet, anyone have anything at all to say that might help?


Thanks a lot,

Dan

[trulad]

I would try setting Boot from CDROM in the BIOS, Boot from your XP CD and use the Repair option. See if that works.
Trudy

[andyms18a]

your best option is to install one hdd on a standerd ide cable on your motherboard and install windows first then update and insatll motherboard drivers and sata drivers befor switching to raid

[M. A. Dockter]

I have the same mobo as you (just bought rev2 a week or so ago). When I was buying it I remember some folks on other message boards reporting problems with the board in XP Setup (by the majority) for one of 2 reasons.

I personally don't have SATA on my system (waiting for WD to released a bigger Raptor so the 36GB becomes a bit cheaper) but I have a funny feeling it's the SATA Drivers you are using, or something with XP not liking the SATA RAID 0 Array you have.

The ASUS website is down..but when it comes back up take a gander at http://www.asus.com/support/download...A7N8X%20Deluxe and try using the most up to date SATA Drivers they have avalible.