XP install issues

[Dayin]

I'm installing Windows XP Professional on two newly built systems, and neither install is going well.

On one I'm using a Raid 5 configuration with three hard drives. I managed to get the RAID drivers loaded at the appropriate time, and the hard drives formatted, but about halfway through the first half of the install process (Usually around 37%) it craps out, flashes red, and reboots. Also randomly in the steps leading up to that the CD drive will just stop, and the install will halt.

The second computer is just running one hard drive. Same motherboard as the first. I've been able to get through most of the preinstaller to load the first setup stage, just before partitioning and formatting, but it either stops, or flashes red and reboots.

Most of the time I can recognize patterns in when they will reboot, but often they just stop installing and need to be manually rebooted. Specs Below:

Compy 1
ASUS M2N-E SLI AM2 NVIDIA nForce 500 SLI MCP ATX AMD Motherboard
HITACHI Deskstar T7K500 HDT725050VLA360 (0A33437) 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive x 3
LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner With 12X DVD-RAM Write Black SATA Model LH-20A1S OEM BK
XCLIO STABLEPOWER 500W ATX 500W Power Supply
Leadtek PX8500GT 256MB GeForce 8500GT 256MB 128-bit GDDR2 PCI Express x16 SLI Supported Video Card
Creative Sound Blaster SB0570 Audigy SE 7.1 Channels PCI Interface Sound Card
Patriot Extreme Performance 1GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)
AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+(65W) Windsor 2.0GHz Socket AM2 Processor Model ADO3800CUBOX

Compy 2
ASUS M2N-E SLI AM2 NVIDIA nForce 500 SLI MCP ATX AMD Motherboard
Western Digital Caviar SE WD800JD 80GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
ASUS Black SATA DVD-ROM Drive Model DVD-E616A3T OEM
APEVIA ATX-CW500WP4 ATX 500W Power Supply
Leadtek PX8500GT 256MB GeForce 8500GT 256MB 128-bit GDDR2 PCI Express x16 SLI Supported Video Card
Patriot Extreme Performance 1GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)
AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+(65W) Windsor 2.0GHz Socket AM2 Processor Model ADO3800CUBOX

2nd same as first sans Sound card and hard drive configuration. If anyone has any pointers, or notices any incompatibility issues, please let me know. Working on a deadline to get these running for a medical office, so I'd like to have it resolved quickly.

 

[Maxtr0sity]

Did you tell your BIOS you're doing RAID5? Test the XP CD on another system, try another CD.

 

[Dayin]

Set up the Raid in the bios correctly as far as I can tell, loaded the RAID drivers at the appropriate time.

Using two different install CDs, one for each computer. I guess I haven't switched them but I doubt I had the bad luck of getting two faulty CDs.

The second compy has a single SATA drive, but I shouldn't have to load the SCSI/RAID drivers because I'm not using RAID, right? (I haven't been on the second, should I?)

 

[SmokeRngs]

Use another computer to get memtest and have it's image burned to a CD. Maybe, make two copies. Stick said CDs into the optical drives of each system and allow it to boot from CD and allow the program to run it's course a few times. Come back later and see if there are any errors with the RAM. If so, mess around a bit with manually setting the memory timings and voltages to what the RAM should be running at instead of using SPD.

Run memtest again and check for errors. If there are still errors, you either have RAM that isn't compatible with that motherboard or your RAM is bad. This should be your first step. If the RAM turns out good, then come back here and we'll see about the next step.

 

[Dayin]

Back to work after the weekend. . .

Thanks a lot for the tip. Memtest showed up all kinds of errors, so I played around with frequencies and finally got something that the memory could handle. Problem solved.