Windows Xp problem

[Blackram_air]

I have a friend that has taken their computer to have Windows Xp Pro installed on a brand new 120gig HDD. The system is a Gateway Select 750 with an AMD 750mhz 512mb RAM and now has an unformatted 120gig HDD. The person installing Windows told them that the install stops about half way or so and says unable to install system componet. So they were told that XP is not able to install. All the hardware specs are there for this computer to run XP and it is a brand new HDD. Has anyone else run into this problem and what is the solution. I was thinking that if I get the computer and boot it with XP boot disk from A:\ then I should be able to install from there.

[Sterling_Aug]

Find a real computer tech to install it for them.

[Blackram_air]

I thought the same thing. They are going to bring it to me, and I am going to install it. The error message they say they are getting is "unable to install system componet". I don't know much more than that. Hopefully they will bring it to me this weekend. Could it need the BIOS updated due to the 120gig HDD?

[Midknyte]

definitely check if that board can support drives larger than 32gb. if not, then update the bios or get an ata controller card. a word of warning, have the drivers for the ata card on floppy when you do the xp install. press f6 when prompted and add the drivers.

boot from the xp cd to do the install. partition and format using the xp cd also.

if the install still dies 1/2 way through, copy the i386 folder from the cd to the hard drive, then run the setup from the hard drive.

[Johnny Fist]

I had a very similar problem just this weekend. I solved it by pulling the drive out of the "problem computer" and putting it into the one I'm sitting at now. From there I deleted the partitions I had set up and formatted again. After replacing it into the problem computer the install went smoothly. Maybe this will help.

[Blackram_air]

Just found out last night that the computer tech doing it for them. Found that the new 120gig HDD was dead. So they are getting another one. If that doesn't work, then I will try your guys suggestions when they bring it to me.
Thanks