I have here a HP Pavilion dv6000...

first and foremost from most of the research I have conducted I see that they are notorious for overheating and such. I came across a link to update the BIOS and I guess it is suppose to tell the fans to run more... BIOS update here .... I was wondering if anyone would take a look at this as I have never updated a BIOS and am a bit fearful of messing something up. Does this seem legitimate?

And the other thing...

I suppose the overheating is causing this. The RAM to having VISTA ratio is pretty bad on this persons computer. So, I was(am) going to install XP so that the resources won't be so bogged down all the time. the only reason she uses it is ebay anyway. Regardless ... when I goto the setup on bootup for XP it says that it cannot install XP because the hard drive cannot be found or read. (this disc works on all other tested computers (3) to be double sure ) So, I do a HDD test in BIOS and it says to replace hard disc. From research replacing the HDD has worked for people. So, I go a buy a new HDD for her and put it in... nothing changes. The XP install won't continue because it says the HDD cannot be read. Now, on the original vista still loads. In fact you can spend a considerable amount of time (maybe 1 hour) before the HDD/screen freezes up. Which this seems like a bad sector or something some kind of virus or something of that nature. Yet - as I said putting a new HDD isn't working. So, I am about to attempt to install XP on the new disc from another external computer and then put it in the laptop to see if it'll load. Other than that I am at a stand still... could I please get some help. Thank you so much in advance

hi, its likely a sata harddrive and winxp need sata drivers install before it can see the drive ,this is done by hitting f6 dure winxp first boot to install it ,but you need the drivers on a floppy disk to install them .
having said that you can set bios something like this .
AHCI enabled system by changing BIOS setting to disable AHCI (or RAID which includes AHCI in its functions) and use native SATA IDE emulation mode

something like this on this website .
http://www.mydigitallife.info/2007/10/23/windows-xp-setup-could-not-detect-and-find-any-sata-hard-disk-drive-on-ahci-mode/

hi, its likely a sata harddrive and winxp need sata drivers install before it can see the drive ,this is done by hitting f6 dure winxp first boot to install it ,but you need the drivers on a floppy disk to install them .
having said that you can set bios something like this .
AHCI enabled system by changing BIOS setting to disable AHCI (or RAID which includes AHCI in its functions) and use native SATA IDE emulation mode

something like this on this website .
http://www.mydigitallife.info/2007/10/23/windows-xp-setup-could-not-detect-and-find-any-sata-hard-disk-drive-on-ahci-mode/

this version of bios doesnt let me change the native sata .... i think i ran across this solution elsewhere and i realized then I would have to attempt a slipstream

I would have to attempt a slipstream

correct ,that is you only option that im aware of ,just make sure you have correct sata driver for the motherboard

So the route I went was download a copy of VISTA online. I couldnt find one anywhere like hp.com or microsoft.com I had to torrent it. But, because the HP came with a legit copy and the Product ID on the bottom of the laptop is legal and not blacklisted and because this laptop is not some kind of hack I was able to help myself. To bad the slipstream didnt work they would have prefered to have XP on this system. the copy or cloning didnt work because the original hard drive was corrupt as stated before. So. ... this problem is solved... just going with Vista and/or above on new HDD.


Manufactorers made it where XP and before is NOT recognized on these machines. they will trick the OS to think there is no HDD.

Manufactorers made it where XP and before is NOT recognized on these machines. they will trick the OS to think there is no HDD.

never heard that one before ,what make and model is it ,see it done all the time,but just end up with xp and no xp drivers for devices,so have to put vista back on[we now make sure that maker has xp driver before we try ] at repair shop i help out at .

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