i need help with my new computer

[GonaN]

i just installed windows xp professional, using that xp pro 6 disk setup. and once it is installed it runs very badly, moving a window takes up 72% of cpu and i have 2GHZ AMD Athlon Xp processor and 1GB ram. and now i am trying to F disk my hard drive and install xp pro again using other boot up disks such 95,98,me,xp and i keep getting the same message for each of them "invalid system disk". It only seems to except the XP Pro 6 disk setup, and i do not want to use them anymore becuase on every computer i have used that on it comes up with the same problem. (this problem exsists on all 3 of my computers)

i have checked the speed of my processor and ram, and both check out fine.

i also have a couple more problems. i have a 250GB hard drive and windows is only showing 127GB, but my bios shows 250GB.

i also have got a CTX P922E LCD monitor and i need to install drivers for it, to do so i need to go into device manager and find "Monitors/Default Monitor" but for some strange reaon i do not have "monitors" in my device manager.

Any help to resolve these issues would be a blessing from god! for it has well and truely fried my Brains!!!

THANKYOU!!

Mike.

[stroyal]

I can help with your monitor.
Right click your desktop choose properties then the settings tab, then choose advanced. there will be a monitor tab.

Welcome to TechIMO.

[jmichna]

Some suggestions...
Use your 250gb hard drive manufacturer's installation utility to partition and setup your hard drive. Just about every HD maker has a utility you can download, and create a bootable floppy or CD to prepare your drive.

See also this link: http://www.seagate.com/support/kb/di...137/index.html regarding drives larger than 137gb.

This has more info specific to WinXP... you need SP-1 or later: http://www.seagate.com/support/kb/di.../os/winxp.html

Before performing any troubleshooting with large capacity drives in Windows XP, confirm that you have Service Pack 1 or higher. Without this service pack it is unsafe to operate a large capacity ATA drive in Windows XP.

To determine if Windows XP is at Service pack 1 or higher follow these steps:

Click on the Start button.
Click on Control Panel.
Click on Performance and Maintenance.
Click the System icon.
View the 4th line down to determine your service pack level. Click here for an example screen shot.
If it does not say "Service Pack 1" or greater, an upgrade is required to support drives larger than 137GB.

Why are you using the six floppies, rather than the WinXP installation CD? This is a bootable CD, and you can install straight from there.

Re slow hard drive... are you using the correct ATA-66 (80-wire) cables? Is UDMA-5 enabled? Verify this is set to "auto" or "enabled" in BIOS.

Some detailed system specs would be a BIG help to offer further suggestions.

[rpertusio]

Originally posted by GonaN
it runs very badly, moving a window takes up 72% of cpu

Wait! I think all you need are some graphics card drivers. Tell us what graphics card you have and we can tell you where to get the drivers for it. (These drivers are different from your monitor drivers.)

- rp

[tgxiii]

Yeah, try installing all the drivers needed for your system (video card, chipset, etc.). I find that before installing the video card driver, the windows move very slowly and in a choppy way.

[GonaN]

i cant install my graphics card drivers either becuase on device manager "display adaptors" is not showing just like "monitors". i tried going to "monitor" by right clicking on the desktop, going to settings, advanced, monitor, but i could not do anything.

i have "Creative 3D blaster 5 FX5600" graphics card.

i partitioned my hard drive and then i had to F disk it and format it before the Windows Xp Pro disk would finally decide to work. so i have managed to install xp pro again, but i am having the same problems as before. and now windows is only showng 116GB on each partition when it should be 125GB each.

the only time windows xp pro has worked great on one of my computers is when i used xp pro as an upgrade from 98. but i could not do that this time because, the windows 98 disk was not getting recognised or something it keeps saying "invalid system disk".

[jmichna]

Originally posted by GonaN
...but i am having the same problems as before. and now windows is only showng 116GB on each partition when it should be 125GB each....

116GB is what your drive (once formatted) should show:
Your "250GB" drive has 250,000,000,000 bytes (hence, each of your "125GB" partitions has 125,000,000,000 bytes)

125,000,000,000 bytes /1024 = 122,070,312.5 KB
122,070,312.5 KB / 1024 = 119209.29 MB
119209.29 MB / 1024 = 116.41 GB

One of my other posts explains in more detail:

originally posted by jmichna
Almost got it, but not quite:
Originally, Bytes, KB, MB, GB, etc. were calculated from binary:
1024 B = 1 KB
1024 kB = 1 MB (or, 1024 x 1024 B)
1024 mB = 1 GB (or 1024 x 1024 x 1024 B) = 1,073,741,824 Bytes

Several years back, some official (technical or trade) organization (don't recall right now what the name is) re-defined the standard capacity descriptions for hard drives based on a decimal system e.g.,
1000 B = 1 KB
1000 KB = 1 MB
1000 MB = 1 GB (or 1000 x 1000 x 1000) = 1,000,000,000 Bytes
so, a "200 GB" -- as defined by the industry -- drive would actually contain 200,000,000,000 Bytes

The hardware, however, doesn't read the "official" definition, and still calculates and produces usable capacity based on binary:

200,000,000,000 B / 1024 = 195,312,500 KB
195,312,500 KB / 1024 = 190,734.86 MB
190,734.86 MB / 1024 = 186.264 GB

Anyway, that is the gist of the whole capacity misunderstanding.. terribly misleading (makes the published capacities appear larger), and -- IMO -- we should have stuck to the original definitions.