Jim Skamarakas

I cannot boot from or read the Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate DVD. Not the 32 bit or the 64 bit disks. I can read the 32 on another computer, so I know it has to be something on this PC. This is a holographic DVD, not an ISO, copy, bootleg or piurated disk. At this point, if I can just make a flat file copy of it and run the upgrade that way i would be happy. But I cannot read the DVD on this machine. Another option is to use an external USB drive to make a copy of the DVD, if push comes to shove.

I did an upgrade to the DVD burner bios for the SONY DRU-510A internal drive I have, but that did not clear up the problem.

I went to Windows Update, but all that came down was the most recent security updates to choose from. Now I am looking for a BIOS update as a possible solution. My current version of the ASUS Update software is V5.22.02. When I connected without the Passive box checked, it just hangs. Set it to Passive, and it immediatley found an update for itself. Once that is done I will have to see what happens.

ASUS Update downloads AsusUpdt_V71304.zip and updates to ASUS Update V7.13.04. The motherboard is an P4P800S-X from ASUS and the BIOS is currently 1010.002. Off to ASUS for some updated drivers and an updated BIOS if they have them.

At this point I decided to check and see if my computer can run Windows VISTA. I popped over to Microsoft and grabbed the Windows Vista Upgrade Advisor 1.0

Your computer can run Windows Vista

Based on our scan of your system, Windows Vista Business appears to be the best edition for you. For information about other editions, click the edition names in the left pane.

Category	Action Required	Explanation
CPU	No action required	Your computer’s CPU is Intel® Pentium® 4 CPU 2.80GHz
System memory (RAM)	No action required	Your computer has 2.00 GB of RAM.
DVD drive	No action required	Your computer can read DVDs.
Video card	No action required	Your current video card will support the Windows Aero™ user experience.

Glad I checked this out first, or at all. I never suspected this, but while I was doing other downloads above, this only took a few seconds to run.

Finally got the disk read on a 3rd drive, but it failed to read install.wim. Off to a 4th computer to copy INSTALL.WIM onto a portable USB drive, and then onto the drive on the 1st PC. I called into Microsoft support, have an incident number, and will be called tomorrow for a replacement DVD. 2 that won’t read it at all, a 3rd that won’t read one file, and a 4th that read it fine. Something is goofy with that one DVD, or I have problems on DVD drives that around 2 years or less old.

Booted up, and the partitions are still messed up. I really need a bootable DVD to make the changes, fix the partitions and get things working straight again.

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Categories: technology
Tags: computers, microsoft, technology, vista