Slipstreaming XPSP3

My post-college niece has an old Dimension 2400 which, after a RAM
upgrade, has served her needs well despite its age. Recently she's been
doing a lot of social networking and picking up viruses. A few weeks ago I
removed some fake AV malware, postponing the inevitable
wipe-and-reinstall. This week she emailed me that she had picked up yet
another fake antivirus.

Since she lives across the state, I had started to prepare for my repair
visit by getting some discs together. She has Dell XP Home, and since I
have a Dell XP Home SP2 reinstall CD that came with my Optiplex 755, I
thought I'd save time by making an XP3 slipstream disc.

I did the slipstream manually without incident and tried a test boot of
the new CD on my Optiplex. To my surprise it blue-screened with a stop
0x07D at the "starting windows" setup screen. I did a little searching
around and found that the error related to hard drives and controllers,
and that this was often due to booting a CD which lacked SATA drivers for
the target machine.

Waitaminnit ... I had used the Dell XPSP2 install CD on that same Optiplex
755 when the factory Seagate drive died, and the BIOS has been set to the
default (AHCI mode). Why did the original CD work but the same CD with SP3
slipstreamed not work?

The popular wisdom on many web sites was to reset your BIOS to use IDE
emulation mode. I wasn't going to do _that_ ... I already had a working
system.

Looking at web sites devoted to adding SATA drivers to XP install discs,
they all referred to a folder called $OEM$ which had subfolders like $1$
containing drivers. Sure 'nuff ... the original Dell CD has an $OEM$
folder with some utilities, registry files, and CAB files; but no drivers.
How, then, was it loading the SATA drivers at boot time?

I ended up looking at the TXTSETUP.* files left behind after the
slipstream, and discovered that the SP3 integration had replaced the
TXTSETUP.SIF file with a newer one of a different size. Just going on a
hunch, I replaced it with the original off the Dell factory CD, reburned
the slipstream and .... voila .... it now boots without error. I'm hoping
that it actually installs XP without some unforseen consequence of my
tinkering; but I'm not ready to try this at home right now.

Of course all of this is superfluous to my niece's system which uses an
IDE controller. Still it had me wondering; does Dell use a non-standard
way of integrating SATA drivers into the install CD - in a way that a
standard SP3 slipstream ends up undoing?

On Mon, 25 Apr 2011 23:11:34 +0000 (UTC), (Mike S.)
wrote:


My post-college niece has an old Dimension 2400 which, after a RAM
upgrade, has served her needs well despite its age. Recently she's been
doing a lot of social networking and picking up viruses.

Picking up viruses? What ever happened to picking up boys? I know
gender is not as important to some as it used to be, but is there no
limit? Shouldn't one at least date within the same species?

A few weeks ago I
removed some fake AV malware, postponing the inevitable
wipe-and-reinstall. This week she emailed me that she had picked up yet
another fake antivirus.

She doesn't learn quick, does she. Let me help. Boys have two arms,
two legs, and a head. They are usually a little bigger than girls.

Viruses are much smaller.

Since she lives across the state, I had started to prepare for my repair
visit by getting some discs together. She has Dell XP Home, and since I
have a Dell XP Home SP2 reinstall CD that came with my Optiplex 755, I
thought I'd save time by making an XP3 slipstream disc.

Sounds like a great idea.

I did the slipstream manually without incident and tried a test boot of
the new CD on my Optiplex. To my surprise it blue-screened with a stop
0x07D at the "starting windows" setup screen. I did a little searching
around and found that the error related to hard drives and controllers,
and that this was often due to booting a CD which lacked SATA drivers for
the target machine.

Waitaminnit ... I had used the Dell XPSP2 install CD on that same Optiplex
755 when the factory Seagate drive died, and the BIOS has been set to the
default (AHCI mode). Why did the original CD work but the same CD with SP3
slipstreamed not work?

The popular wisdom on many web sites was to reset your BIOS to use IDE
emulation mode. I wasn't going to do _that_ ... I already had a working
system.

You're right, afaik. Don't go looking for trouble. Better to buy a
cheap old machine to do testing on than fiddle with your own machine.

Looking at web sites devoted to adding SATA drivers to XP install discs,
they all referred to a folder called $OEM$ which had subfolders like $1$
containing drivers. Sure 'nuff ... the original Dell CD has an $OEM$
folder with some utilities, registry files, and CAB files; but no drivers.
How, then, was it loading the SATA drivers at boot time?

I ended up looking at the TXTSETUP.* files left behind after the
slipstream, and discovered that the SP3 integration had replaced the
TXTSETUP.SIF file with a newer one of a different size. Just going on a
hunch, I replaced it with the original off the Dell factory CD, reburned
the slipstream and .... voila .... it now boots without error. I'm hoping

Hmmm.

that it actually installs XP without some unforseen consequence of my
tinkering; but I'm not ready to try this at home right now.

Of course all of this is superfluous to my niece's system which uses an
IDE controller. Still it had me wondering; does Dell use a non-standard
way of integrating SATA drivers into the install CD - in a way that a
standard SP3 slipstream ends up undoing?

Ah, a real DELL question. I should say that after about 20 attempts
to slipsteam SP's, using 2 or 3 different methods including
Autostreamer and by hand, I never even finished the third-to-last
step, the step before adding those two files and burning. The step
that uses update.exe iirc.

I had hoped to be enlightened by your post but it's not about the same
problem.

On Apr 25, 7:11*pm, (Mike S.) wrote:
My post-college niece has an old Dimension 2400 which, after a RAM
upgrade, has served her needs well despite its age. Recently she's been
doing a lot of social networking and picking up viruses. A few weeks ago I
removed some fake AV malware, postponing the inevitable
wipe-and-reinstall. This week she emailed me that she had picked up yet
another fake antivirus.

Since she lives across the state, I had started to prepare for my repair
visit by getting some discs together. She has Dell XP Home, and since I
have a Dell XP Home SP2 reinstall CD that came with my Optiplex 755, I
thought I'd save time by making an XP3 slipstream disc.

I did the slipstream manually without incident and tried a test boot of
the new CD on my Optiplex. To my surprise it blue-screened with a stop
0x07D at the "starting windows" setup screen. I did a little searching
around and found that the error related to hard drives and controllers,
and that this was often due to booting a CD which lacked SATA drivers for
the target machine.

Waitaminnit ... I had used the Dell XPSP2 install CD on that same Optiplex
755 when the factory Seagate drive died, and the BIOS has been set to the
default (AHCI mode). Why did the original CD work but the same CD with SP3
slipstreamed not work?

The popular wisdom on many web sites was to reset your BIOS to use IDE
emulation mode. I wasn't going to do _that_ ... I already had a working
system.

Looking at web sites devoted to adding SATA drivers to XP install discs,
they all referred to a folder called $OEM$ which had subfolders like $1$
containing drivers. Sure 'nuff ... the original Dell CD has an $OEM$
folder with some utilities, registry files, and CAB files; but no drivers..
How, then, was it loading the SATA drivers at boot time?

I ended up looking at the TXTSETUP.* files left behind after the
slipstream, and discovered that the SP3 integration had replaced the
TXTSETUP.SIF file with a newer one of a different size. Just going on a
hunch, I replaced it with the original off the Dell factory CD, reburned
the slipstream and .... voila .... it now boots without error. I'm hoping
that it actually installs XP without some unforseen consequence of my
tinkering; but I'm not ready to try this at home right now.

Of course all of this is superfluous to my niece's system which uses an
IDE controller. Still it had me wondering; does Dell use a non-standard
way of integrating SATA drivers into the install CD - in a way that a
standard SP3 slipstream ends up undoing?

Suggestion: Save yourself the headaches of trying to slipstrean SP3
onto the Dell XP Home SP2 CD. Simply install XP Home with SP2, then
the drivers (starting with the Intel chipset drivers, of course), then
connect up to the Microsoft mothership and install SP3. To protect
her better, you need to download and install all the other 300 or
400MB of patches, bubble gum, tissue paper, and rubber bands that hold
XP together and make it marginally more secure.

Now why in hades didn't Microsoft ever do XP SP4 ???? Sheesh! Talk
about not caring for your customers. Well, Micro$oft never did, only
about their billfolds.

.... Ben Myers

On Apr 25, 7:25*pm, mm wrote:



Ah, a real DELL question. *I should say that after about 20 attempts
to slipsteam SP's, using 2 or 3 different methods including
Autostreamer and by hand, I never even finished the third-to-last
step, the step before adding those two files and burning. * *The step
that uses update.exe iirc.

I had hoped to be enlightened by your post but it's not about the same
problem.

Have you ever tried nLite? http://www.nliteos.com/nlite.html

On 4/25/2011 7:11 PM, Mike S. wrote:
My post-college niece has an old Dimension 2400 which, after a RAM
upgrade, has served her needs well despite its age. Recently she's been
doing a lot of social networking and picking up viruses. A few weeks ago I
removed some fake AV malware, postponing the inevitable
wipe-and-reinstall. This week she emailed me that she had picked up yet
another fake antivirus.

Since she lives across the state, I had started to prepare for my repair
visit by getting some discs together. She has Dell XP Home, and since I
have a Dell XP Home SP2 reinstall CD that came with my Optiplex 755, I
thought I'd save time by making an XP3 slipstream disc.

I did the slipstream manually without incident and tried a test boot of
the new CD on my Optiplex. To my surprise it blue-screened with a stop
0x07D at the "starting windows" setup screen. I did a little searching
around and found that the error related to hard drives and controllers,
and that this was often due to booting a CD which lacked SATA drivers for
the target machine.

Waitaminnit ... I had used the Dell XPSP2 install CD on that same Optiplex
755 when the factory Seagate drive died, and the BIOS has been set to the
default (AHCI mode). Why did the original CD work but the same CD with SP3
slipstreamed not work?

The popular wisdom on many web sites was to reset your BIOS to use IDE
emulation mode. I wasn't going to do _that_ ... I already had a working
system.

Looking at web sites devoted to adding SATA drivers to XP install discs,
they all referred to a folder called $OEM$ which had subfolders like $1$
containing drivers. Sure 'nuff ... the original Dell CD has an $OEM$
folder with some utilities, registry files, and CAB files; but no drivers.
How, then, was it loading the SATA drivers at boot time?

I ended up looking at the TXTSETUP.* files left behind after the
slipstream, and discovered that the SP3 integration had replaced the
TXTSETUP.SIF file with a newer one of a different size. Just going on a
hunch, I replaced it with the original off the Dell factory CD, reburned
the slipstream and .... voila .... it now boots without error. I'm hoping
that it actually installs XP without some unforseen consequence of my
tinkering; but I'm not ready to try this at home right now.

Of course all of this is superfluous to my niece's system which uses an
IDE controller. Still it had me wondering; does Dell use a non-standard
way of integrating SATA drivers into the install CD - in a way that a
standard SP3 slipstream ends up undoing?



she sounds like a candidate for www.ubuntu.com. not likely to get a
virus with that. or if she has over a 1gb of ram and over 40gb of disk
then install windows 7. it works nicely on a dimension 2400 and
installs smoothly with the only hassle being installing the windows xp
video driver under windows 7.

On Mon, 25 Apr 2011 18:01:07 -0700 (PDT), Ben Myers
wrote:

On Apr 25, 7:11*pm, (Mike S.) wrote:
My post-college niece has an old Dimension 2400 which, after a RAM
upgrade, has served her needs well despite its age. Recently she's been
doing a lot of social networking and picking up viruses. A few weeks ago I
removed some fake AV malware, postponing the inevitable
wipe-and-reinstall. This week she emailed me that she had picked up yet
another fake antivirus.

Since she lives across the state, I had started to prepare for my repair
visit by getting some discs together. She has Dell XP Home, and since I
have a Dell XP Home SP2 reinstall CD that came with my Optiplex 755, I
thought I'd save time by making an XP3 slipstream disc.

I did the slipstream manually without incident and tried a test boot of
the new CD on my Optiplex. To my surprise it blue-screened with a stop
0x07D at the "starting windows" setup screen. I did a little searching
around and found that the error related to hard drives and controllers,
and that this was often due to booting a CD which lacked SATA drivers for
the target machine.

Waitaminnit ... I had used the Dell XPSP2 install CD on that same Optiplex
755 when the factory Seagate drive died, and the BIOS has been set to the
default (AHCI mode). Why did the original CD work but the same CD with SP3
slipstreamed not work?

The popular wisdom on many web sites was to reset your BIOS to use IDE
emulation mode. I wasn't going to do _that_ ... I already had a working
system.

Looking at web sites devoted to adding SATA drivers to XP install discs,
they all referred to a folder called $OEM$ which had subfolders like $1$
containing drivers. Sure 'nuff ... the original Dell CD has an $OEM$
folder with some utilities, registry files, and CAB files; but no drivers.
How, then, was it loading the SATA drivers at boot time?

I ended up looking at the TXTSETUP.* files left behind after the
slipstream, and discovered that the SP3 integration had replaced the
TXTSETUP.SIF file with a newer one of a different size. Just going on a
hunch, I replaced it with the original off the Dell factory CD, reburned
the slipstream and .... voila .... it now boots without error. I'm hoping
that it actually installs XP without some unforseen consequence of my
tinkering; but I'm not ready to try this at home right now.

Of course all of this is superfluous to my niece's system which uses an
IDE controller. Still it had me wondering; does Dell use a non-standard
way of integrating SATA drivers into the install CD - in a way that a
standard SP3 slipstream ends up undoing?

Suggestion: Save yourself the headaches of trying to slipstrean SP3
onto the Dell XP Home SP2 CD. Simply install XP Home with SP2, then
the drivers (starting with the Intel chipset drivers, of course), then
connect up to the Microsoft mothership and install SP3. To protect

Yes, I've noticed that the automatic updates include SP3, and SP2 iirc
and IE. Did automatic updates always include these things?

Given my bad luck with slipstreaming, maybe I should give up that
dream.

Bob, I heard about nLite at the time, but I can't remember if I tried
to use it. I have to check on that.

her better, you need to download and install all the other 300 or
400MB of patches, bubble gum, tissue paper, and rubber bands that hold
XP together and make it marginally more secure.

Sometimes I read the description of the security patches, and they
only refer to Internet Explorer. Is that because they only affect
Internet Explorer, or because they refuse to acknowledge Firefox,
Opera, etc?

Now why in hades didn't Microsoft ever do XP SP4 ???? Sheesh! Talk
about not caring for your customers. Well, Micro$oft never did, only
about their billfolds.

... Ben Myers

How do I decipher your email? (Mine is correctly listed in GG)
bob

In article ,
Bob Villa wrote:
On Apr 25, 7:25*pm, mm wrote:



Ah, a real DELL question. *I should say that after about 20 attempts
to slipsteam SP's, using 2 or 3 different methods including
Autostreamer and by hand, I never even finished the third-to-last
step, the step before adding those two files and burning. * *The step
that uses update.exe iirc.

I had hoped to be enlightened by your post but it's not about the same
problem.

Have you ever tried nLite? http://www.nliteos.com/nlite.html

No, but after I stumbled through a manual solution I read about it. The
caveat is to do the slipstream on a machine actually running XP; if you do
it on Vista (and perhaps W7) there can be CD key/activation issues.

In article ,
Bob Villa wrote:
How do I decipher your email? (Mine is correctly listed in GG)
bob

Reverse each of the three parts delineated by the @ and period.

=

In article ,
Christopher Muto wrote:
On 4/25/2011 7:11 PM, Mike S. wrote:
My post-college niece has an old Dimension 2400 which, after a RAM
upgrade, has served her needs well despite its age. Recently she's been
doing a lot of social networking and picking up viruses. A few weeks ago I
removed some fake AV malware, postponing the inevitable
wipe-and-reinstall. This week she emailed me that she had picked up yet
another fake antivirus.

Since she lives across the state, I had started to prepare for my repair
visit by getting some discs together. She has Dell XP Home, and since I
have a Dell XP Home SP2 reinstall CD that came with my Optiplex 755, I
thought I'd save time by making an XP3 slipstream disc.

I did the slipstream manually without incident and tried a test boot of
the new CD on my Optiplex. To my surprise it blue-screened with a stop
0x07D at the "starting windows" setup screen. I did a little searching
around and found that the error related to hard drives and controllers,
and that this was often due to booting a CD which lacked SATA drivers for
the target machine.

Waitaminnit ... I had used the Dell XPSP2 install CD on that same Optiplex
755 when the factory Seagate drive died, and the BIOS has been set to the
default (AHCI mode). Why did the original CD work but the same CD with SP3
slipstreamed not work?

The popular wisdom on many web sites was to reset your BIOS to use IDE
emulation mode. I wasn't going to do _that_ ... I already had a working
system.

Looking at web sites devoted to adding SATA drivers to XP install discs,
they all referred to a folder called $OEM$ which had subfolders like $1$
containing drivers. Sure 'nuff ... the original Dell CD has an $OEM$
folder with some utilities, registry files, and CAB files; but no drivers.
How, then, was it loading the SATA drivers at boot time?

I ended up looking at the TXTSETUP.* files left behind after the
slipstream, and discovered that the SP3 integration had replaced the
TXTSETUP.SIF file with a newer one of a different size. Just going on a
hunch, I replaced it with the original off the Dell factory CD, reburned
the slipstream and .... voila .... it now boots without error. I'm hoping
that it actually installs XP without some unforseen consequence of my
tinkering; but I'm not ready to try this at home right now.

Of course all of this is superfluous to my niece's system which uses an
IDE controller. Still it had me wondering; does Dell use a non-standard
way of integrating SATA drivers into the install CD - in a way that a
standard SP3 slipstream ends up undoing?



she sounds like a candidate for www.ubuntu.com. not likely to get a
virus with that. or if she has over a 1gb of ram and over 40gb of disk
then install windows 7. it works nicely on a dimension 2400 and
installs smoothly with the only hassle being installing the windows xp
video driver under windows 7.

First I'm gonna create a low-privilege account on her machine for web
browsing. I'm presently using Ubuntu for banking and other critical stuff;
so I'm well acquainted with its virtues.