Installing Windows XP on X60s

[beyonson]

After a weekend of troubleshooting and forum diving, I finally got Windows XP Home back on my X60s (the OS it shipped with).

Posting this to help others, if anyone is trying this and running into issues. First I will go into what worked:

• Burned Windows XP Home Edition SP3 to a CD (https://archive.org/details/WinXPHomeEditionSP3x86)

• Disabled core multi processing in BIOS

• Changed SATA mode in BIOS from AHCI to Compatibility

• Booted from CD drive in the X60 docking station (did not try USB CD drive)

My initial approach was the most recommended method of slipstreaming SATA drivers into the installation disk. Every time I did that I was met with the error: "iaStor.sys is corrupted". I think this means I was using the incorrect driver. I tried so many that I thought were right for my machine, and none of them worked. If anyone has a better idea as to why this was not working, I am extremely curious and would love to know.

I am super excited to have XP on this machine. It's so awesome seeing XP on a little 4:3 display with some really clean bezels.

[Bondi]

I installed WinXP on my X60s many years ago, and vaguely remember adding some driver on a flopy disk at some point during the installation. It went with no issues then. SATA mode was AHCI, and made no other changes in BIOS.

[dr_st]

The recommended approach for getting XP to work in AHCI mode is to first install it in Compatibility (IDE) mode, then download the AHCI driver for your controller, install the driver use a special "prep" script (frequently shipped with the drivers, at least in the Intel case), enable the AHCI service so that it is ready to run at next boot. Then reboot and change to AHCI in the BIOS. When Windows starts booting, the AHCI service will already be active, with the newly installed driver.

This way, no floppies and no slipstreaming is needed, and the benefit is that Windows will also be able to work in the Compatibility mode with the base driver if you ever decide to go back to it.

[beyonson]

Yup, Windows XP recommends a floppy, but I didn't have an external floppy for my machine. I also initially tried installing it in compatibility mode with a USB, so I chalked that off as not working. I think I only tried it again out of desperation, but I'm glad I did lol.

[nfraser01]

• Burned Windows XP Home Edition SP3 to a CD (https://archive.org/details/WinXPHomeEditionSP3x86)

• Disabled core multi processing in BIOS

• Changed SATA mode in BIOS from AHCI to Compatibility

• Booted from CD drive in the X60 docking station (did not try USB CD drive)

From memory Windows XP SP3 natively supports SATA (previous versions did not), however not in AHCI mode. If you have the SATA compatability mode in effect SP3 should just boot without slipstreaming. You only need the floppy/slipstreaming options if you want AHCI compatability.

Booting Windows XP SP3 from USB drive is the easiest way to do this on single spindle devices like the X series. I typcially use Rufus or YUMI for this.

HTH

[JBUK]

The simplest method to instal AHCI drivers after instal of XP is to use the script mentioned above.
This comes as part of the Intel Matrix Storage Manager drivers on this site and will be found in the IMSM\Prepare folder. Simply clicking on the Install.cmd then automatically installs all required drivers allowing selection of AHCI instead of compatibility at next boot when the new drivers are installed by following the prompts. Finally a second boot finds AHCI in use.

[beyonson]

Simply clicking on the Install.cmd then automatically installs all required drivers allowing selection of AHCI instead of compatibility at next boot when the new drivers are installed by following the prompts. Finally a second boot finds AHCI in use.

Great, thank you for the elaboration (and thank you everyone for the helpful info) !