better than your pointless idea of "RTFM".. now please.. back off. Don't start the usual trouble, I'm just looking for a solution.

That first pic is especially horrible.

what motherboard is it? Also, what files are you putting on the floppy? is the floppy formatted properly? I know i had a problem with this once b/c my mobo had two places to enable boot from other devices in the bios, and it wasn't exactly obvious how to arrange them.

If it's not a BIOS issue, you can try installing to the 8gig disk, get the SATA controller working w/i windows, then image the 8gig drive over to the SATA drive. There may be an issue here of getting the SATA driver to work on boot, so I can't promise this will work, but it's a fairly quick process to install XP and image a drive and might be worth checking out.

Mod Note: if you don't have any technical HELP to give, don't bother posting.

I won't bother posting here anymore.. after my 2 or 3 suggestions meet a reply of mudslinging... I figured that cat one would stir it up a bit.. you guys seem to be pretty sensitive towards that stuff.. but desparate times call for desparate measures...

and if all else fails.. rma...

James, I'm using an Asus A7N8X Deluxe. I'm starting to think its a format issue. XP doesnt read a valid windows partition, so i like your idea of taking it to a preinstalled windows environment. The files on the floppy are SATA controller driver... win xp install doesnt detect my drive unless i press f6 and use the drivers.

The problem I saw with an image is that Windows would be trying to load the wrong drivers to run the HD.

Since Windows can see the drive, partition and format it in Windows, then yank out the other drive and install Windows to the already formatted partition on the SATA drive, which setup should then recognize if Windows does.

ill try that.. just finished installation of xp on the 8gig...

Well that worked.. using Seagate's software, I installed the drive, formatted it, and copied all files from 8 gig to 120 gig, all from windows. Pulled the 8gig drive out for now.. only way for SATA to boot up is if no other ide drives are connected (pretty weird). Thinking about getting UATA version of my drive, but meh.. oh and bios still doesn't find the drive.. it just says "none". But at least everything is up and running..

that is weird, considering sata doesn't = ide.......