[nwguitar]

First post...but just got my computer about a week ago (Refurbed 80gb MacBook Pro). So far been real happy with the computer, and have had no problems...until tody when I went to install boot camp and XP SP2.

The boot camp went fine, burned the drivers to a CD, then made it all the way through the XP install and had XP setup, install, and open fine. Messed around with the Internet/Network settings on the computer w/in XP before remembering to install the drivers from the CD. When I did install drivers, got all the way through the process and then everything froze up at the "registering" section. At that point, all of the keys and the trackpad froze up and the only thing I could do was shut the computer down.

Tried restarting and was able to get the "hd" selection, but when trying to open Windows, couldn't complete because (surprisingly) the drivers weren't installed.

What now? Do I need to go back from to square one and reinstall Windows from the bootcamp partitioning page? Poetic that the computer should be fine until I put on Windows...as if from a movie.

Derek P

[nwguitar]

To further help...here's some the error message I get when I try to reopen windows:

Windows could not start becuase the following file is missing or corrupt:
system32\DRIVERS\pci.sys

You can attempt to repair this file by starting Windows Setup using the original Setup CD-ROM.
Select 'r' at the first screen

Only problem is I can't open Windows, and no matter how I try, I can't open the Windows setup disk either. Tried opening using Boot Camp within OSx and from the HD select page where the disk is one of the options, and both ways I get an error message that stops setup so as not to damage the computer. Get a message with the codes listed below:

SESSION3_INITIALIZATION_FAILED

and

Technical Informtion:
Stop: 0x0000006F (0xC0000020, 0x00000000, 0x00000000, 0x00000000)

The message also tells me to make sure any new hardware or software is properly installed or to contact the manufacturer.

Time to erase the paritition and reinstall the whole thing?

Derek P

[nwguitar]

...and now I've removed and reinstalled the partition using Boot Camp hoping I could make a new partition, install windows on the new partition anew, with the past problems more or less erased. Once the partition was recreated and I tried to install windows via boot camp again, I got the same Session3 error described above.

Now what? As I understand it, if I go to the genius bar, I can't really expect help with this due to the Beta state of Boot Camp?

Derek P

[nwguitar]

Anyone with ideas? I'm totally lost on this and have also gotten no response at the Apple user forums.

At any rate, here's a picture of the screen I get when I try to reload Windows from the CD:

Screenshot on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Any help would be great. Feels like I'm really on my own with this one. Nothing online and nothing from Apple.

Derek P

[nwguitar]

Nothing like a converstation with myself....

Anyhow, I found a description of someone else having a similar problem to what I encountered.

BootCamp installation/setup issues. - Page 2 - macosx.com - Mac Support

They seem to have solved it by making a copy of the XP SP2 startup disk, but why would this fix anything? Also appears they were having encountering this problem on a MacBook rather than the MacBook Pro I'm using. Is it possible that now I'm looking at a hardware issue.

dp

[ghporter]

Making a copy could have produced a new disc that is more readable than the original. I've recovered audio and data CDs through this method-they would not play/read properly for whatever app I was using, but copying via the OS (Windows in my case) got the discs read carefully and thus cleaned up not-so-readable sectors that could easily cause digital chaos. Like the chaos you're experiencing.

[nwguitar]

For whatever reason, that actually wound up working. I copied the XP disk using the disk utility to make a "disc image," then burnt it to a new disk. Last night got all the way through the install process and was able to load up the couple of work programs I was looking to install.

Funny thing is, I got all the way through and had XP running on my machine the first time using the original disk, but then after I had the install wizard for the Mac drivers CD freeze up inside XP, I kept gettting the above described errors. I think I may have unintentionally helped the freeze up happen by adjusting my network/internet setting within XP before installing the drivers.

Anyhow, all's well, I've got XP up and so far so good.

Derek P

[ghporter]

Aren't computers wonderful? I'm pretty sure my explanation is somewhere near what happens when you get good results from a copy of a "bad" disc, but whether that's why or it's because the digital fairies sprinkle byte dust on it, it works and that's what's important.

[nwguitar]

Hmm, now that I think about it and while I couldn't identify it at the time, I did hear little bells when I was making a copy of the cd.

....or was that my tinnitus?

Derek P

[ghporter]

Originally Posted by nwguitar

Hmm, now that I think about it and while I couldn't identify it at the time, I did hear little bells when I was making a copy of the cd.

....or was that my tinnitus?

Derek P

I can never tell the difference myself.

Glad you have things working now!

[elniney]

can i just download Service pack 2?? and continue with the installation of drivers?

im having the same trouble as all of you and i really need to get this up and running ASAP...
about the Windows logo i click continue and it frezes .. i click stop and it stops .. 

please help

[nwguitar]

I think there is a way to do that, but I believe the only way to make that work is do what I've seen people call "slipstreaming" the disk. From the little bit of scanning on the topic I've done, it appears that somehow you are able to download SP2 and add that to a windows disk. I think you copy the windows disk to your hardrive, download SP2, and then burn it all back to a new disk.

I personally didn't try that so don't know about how it works, and my problem in freezing up was not related to having a non-SP2 version of Windows.

Maybe try doing a search for "slipstreaming" either here or over at the Apple/bootcamp forums and see what you find.

hth,

Derek P

[ghporter]

elniney, you need to download SP2 and then combine it with your pre-SP2 version of Windows. You can do this fairly simply and without too much fuss-and of course FOR FREE using a number of tools. See the "Slipstreaming" thread stuck at the top of this forum.

It's imperative that you combine SP2 with your Windows install disc (the process produces a new disc, by the way), because the Boot Camp drivers are specific to SP2 and later versions of Windows; they changed to a different driver model with SP2, so Boot Camp's drivers just will not work with any earlier version. This is probably why your installation stops.

Read the Slipstreaming thread and see if you have the means to do that-or a friend with the means-and let us know how it goes.