tech help needed

[Grim Reaper]

Finally put together my first new build and vista arrived today so thought I would install it.
But the display image is all screwed up including the boot and bios screens. The system appears to be working, but the display is all messed. 9/10 times when boots it is screwed up, the one time out of ten that it is fine, it only stays like this for a few minutes.

System:
Xeon X3220, Gigabyte GAX38DQ6, 2GB PC2-6400, 2x500GB WD HDD, Samsung DVDRW, XFX GF7900GTX

Any ideas

[Blackmage]

What powersupply do you have?

[LegacyOne]

System:
Xeon X3220, Gigabyte GAX38DQ6, 2GB PC2-6400, 2x500GB WD HDD, Samsung DVDRW, XFX GF7900GTX

That Motherboard dose not support Xeon!

[Grim Reaper]

That Motherboard dose not support Xeon!

Officially that is correct, however the X3220 is exactly the same as the Q6600, and everyone states that they are interchangeable.

What powersupply do you have?

CoolerMaster RealPowerPro 1000W

Image has stayed stable this time so far, but have encountered a problem with installation (Vista Ultimate 64): on the screen that say "where do you want to install windows?" it has detected both the hard drives, but it will not allow me to install saying "windows is unable to find a system volume to mett its criteria", and it does not give me the option of formatting the disks.

[burtie]

When you try to install Windows Vista, you may experience one or more of the following symptoms:

• The hard disk on which you want to install Windows Vista is not listed.
• You cannot select a hard disk partition on which to install Windows Vista.
• You cannot format a hard disk partition or partitions.
• You cannot set the correct size for a hard disk partition.
• You receive the following error message:

Windows is unable to find a system volume that meets its criteria for installation

CAUSE

This problem may occur because of one of the following reasons:

• Windows Vista is incompatible with a mass storage controller or a mass storage driver.
• A mass storage controller or a mass storage driver is outdated.
• The hard disk on which you want to install Windows Vista is a dynamic disk.
• A data cable in the computer is loose, or another hardware issue has occurred.
• The hard disk or the Windows file system is damaged.
• You tried to select a FAT32 partition or another type of partition that is incompatible with Windows Vista.

> You cannot select or format a hard disk partition when you try to install Windows Vista

[LegacyOne]

Image has stayed stable this time so far, but have encountered a problem with installation (Vista Ultimate 64): on the screen that say "where do you want to install windows?" it has detected both the hard drives, but it will not allow me to install saying "windows is unable to find a system volume to mett its criteria", and it does not give me the option of formatting the disks.

Are the HDD's in the orange SATA ports?

[Grim Reaper]

Are the HDD's in the orange SATA ports?

Yes.

Ok, partitioned the hard disk, and it let me format it, but now it won't recognise the disk!
Plus the display image is still srewing up making this extremely difficult!

[chrestomanci]

I had a system with similar symptoms a while back. It was running with integrated graphics. I tested the system memory using memtest, and it reported that the RAM was faulty. I was able to cure the problem by removing the offending RAM module.

In your case you have a discrete graphics card. Perhaps you could test with another graphics card, or integrated graphics if your system has it. I don't know of any utility that will test the RAM in a graphics card.

[azrael]

You may need to get the Hard Drive controller driver off of the CD that came with your motherboard and specify it in setup

[azrael]

As for the graphics sounds like a faulty gfx card

[Grim Reaper]

You may need to get the Hard Drive controller driver off of the CD that came with your motherboard and specify it in setup

I have got another graphics card, so the image is fine and stable now, so I guess there is a fault in it.

Managed to actually start installation one one hard drive (had to disconnect the other), but during installation it stopped with an error message that said "cannot install file, the file does not exist" and now can't boot from dos at all. When I try to use the other drive, it will start to boot from the cd drive, and I get the "windows is loading the files" screen and then it just becomes a blank black screen. I have tried clearing the cmos as well as flashing the bios with the latest version, with no change. Also tried to install XP but again no different.

Could the hard disks or motherboard be faulty as well?

Also I gad tried to install the hard disk controller driver off the cd at the point during vista installation (the specify the drive on which to install vista part) but it wouldn't recognise the driver.

[azrael]

Did you extract the driver from the CD as sometimes they are setup files.

[Grim Reaper]

I have downloaded a diagnostic utility from western digital - both hard drives are faulty
Spoke to the tech support at scan - its all going back (mobo, hard drives and graphics card).
Scan tech support were helpful, but not impressed that almost all the hardware that I bought from them is faulty.