[kev1979]

I put this in the OS section, hoping I will get more responses here:

I have just built a new machine MSI MOBO, AMD sempron 64 3000+, 1 GB RAM, the MOBO has onboard GFX and it has a SATA HDD.

The initial boot is fine, I get the blue screen when win xp starts to install.

When I get to the press f6 if you want to install 3rd party drivers (which I want to do) the install process stops (whether I hit f6 or not).

Any ideas what may be causing this, I have checked all connections, I am thinking maybe faulty ram, but have not been able to swap it out yet.

Any ideas gratefully received

[phillysteakandcheese]

I would try booting a "Live CD' and trying to run tests on your system to see if you can isolate a problem.

You can use something like Damn Small Linux (http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/) or a Windows PE disk (http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/).

Also - Is your XP Home CD a "vanilla" off the shelf one, or an OEM version from an old computer? Many OEM disks are customized specifically from the hardware manufacturer and don't work reliably with unknown hardware.

[kev1979]

Thanks for your suggestion, I will try linus, although I have never used it before, and it is a "vanilla" version of xp as you put it, bought it from aria with the componants so it is as Microsoft intended it to be.

I am going to start swaping out the componants with some from my machine, the only problem is, is I don't have a 64 bit cpu to try with it, so I cannot test the CPU or MOBO, but I can check the MEM, HDD and DVDRW, if not I guess it will be a fault with the CPU or MOBO.

I will get back to you with my findings,