Fixing ‘Windows Could not determine if this computer contains a valid system volume’ when installing Windows 2008

I was trying to install Windows Server 2008 Standard x64 on one of our servers, intended to be an internal SQL database server.
It’s equipped with a 3Ware 9650SE 8LPML RAID controller. It has 8x 250gb hard drives.
I’d set up 2 units:

• RAID 0 (Stripe) – For the OS (2 drives)
• RAID 10 (6 drives)

I downloaded the drivers from the 3Ware website, and put them on a USB flash drive.
I should point out at this point, that the download is circa 50mb – the actual drivers are only about 150kb… the rest is a .exe file used for upgrading drivers on an existing system.

You then go through the setup screens, and clicked Load Drivers where you are supposed to select a drive to install on. It finds the USB drive, select the drive… all seems ok so far.

Upon selecting the smaller of the 2 units (my RAID 0 stripe) and pressing next, I got a screen saying:

Windows Could not determine if this computer contains a valid system volume

Uh oh!

After much Googling, I found the problem was in the BIOS – and that the USB drive should be de-selected as a boot device.

I restarted, pressed F2 to get into the BIOS setting, and de-activated the USB drive.

However – this did not work! I still had the same error!

Here are the steps that I used to finally get it to work:

1. Put driver files on USB floppy drive (not sure if this is significant, but it worked for me)
   Remember, the actual driver files are < 200kb – it’s just the EXE file that’s large
2. Restart machine, leaving USB (floppy) plugged in
3. Enter BIOS setup – Boot sequence.
4. Deactivate USB  from the Boot sequence
5. Make the 3ware RAID controller #1 in the sequence
6. Save & Exit
7. Enter Windows 2008 setup again, this time, it should work

I think the key is point #5 – You MUST make the RAID controller the first in the boot sequence.

What effect using the floppy drive had, I’m unsure. Probably nothing.

Tags: Error, Windows Server 2008

Removing a previous version of Windows

If you have installed a newer version of Windows Vista (for example 64 bit instead of 32 bit), and didn’t format your HD first (like I just did) it simply installs the new version, over the top of the old version.

The old version will continue to take up space (around 4gb in my case) while go unused.

If you want to remove it, follow these steps:

Click Start. Type “Disk”
Select Disk Cleanup

In the Disk Cleanup utility, ensure “Previous Windows installation(s)” is selected, and click ok.

That’s it – the old version is gone.

Tags: clean up, windows vista

Windows 7 – Sticky Notes

This is a sticky note!

 

This is something I will use all the time!

Windows 7 has a feature called “Sticky Notes” – basically, these little notes are like post it notes – they stick to your desktop!

You can change the colour, resize, move them around etc… So simple, yet so useful!

Tags: tools, windows 7

How to get Messenger to run in the TaskBar in Windows 7

After installing the Windows 7 RC, I installed the latest Windows Live Messenger.
After using it, it appears that it does not run in the task bar, as it used to in Vista! This is pretty annoying, as I only keep it open to use now and again.

There is a way around this however… you need to set it to run in Compatibility Mode for Windows Vista.

To do this, first exit Messenger, then locate msnmsgr.exe (in your Program Files directory)
Right click it, select Properties

Choose the Compatibility tab, and select Windows Vista.

Hit ok, and then restart Live Messenger.

It now runs in the notification area!

Tags: live messenger, windows 7

Use Notepad2 instead of original Notepad in Windows Vista

Notepad2 is my favourite text editor.
Eventually, I’ll get round to writing a post all about it.
Until then, you can read the Wikipedia page – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notepad2

You can download Notepad2 from http://www.flos-freeware.ch/notepad2.html

Step 1)

Find c:\windows\notepad.exe and c:\windows\system32\notepad.exe (use Windows Explorer)

Change the owner of both files to “Administrators”
In case you are unsure…

Right click on notepad.exe, select properties, select the “Security” panel.
Click “Advanced”

In the resulting dialog, select the Owner tab, then click “Edit…”

Highlight “Administrators” and then click Ok.

Then, back in the Security panel (from start of step 1) click on the Edit button (below list of groups)

Select the Administrators group (see bottom left image below) then click the Full control checkbox, which should select all the other checkboxes.
Click ok.

Step 2)

Rename notepad2.exe to notepad.exe.
Fairly self explanatory – rename wherever you have unzipped notepad2.zip

Step 3)

Move the newly named notepad.exe into c:\windows and c:\windows\system32
Replace the existing notepad.exe with the new one.

Done

Windows will now use notepad2 as it would of used standard notepad.

Tags: notepad2, vista

Disallowed Parent Path Fix

If you ever get this error:

Active Server Pages error ‘ASP 0131′

Disallowed Parent Path

The Include file ‘../myFile.asp’ cannot contain ‘..’ to indicate the parent directory.

or something similar, then below is a quick fix for those of you running IIS6, and want to allow parent paths.

Right click on the web application that’s throwing the error. in my case, its called ‘MySite’

Select Properties.

 

Select the Home Directory tab, as shown above.
Click Configuration

 

Select the Options tab, and you will see a check box for Enable Parent Paths.
Click that, and you’re good to go.

Tags: ASP, IIS, Windows Server 2003