Reloading NT 4.0

[Ayman Altounji]

I am trying to reload NT on a Prosignia 500.

I have Smart Start and Support Software 3.20A. I reload the Windows NT 4.0. Everything works fine until I do the service pack. When I install the service pack 6a, the server will no longer boot. It hangs at the Blue Build Screen. Waits 5 to 10 mins and then reboots.

I tried doing the SSD (I think) and it says no upgrades are needed at this time. I tried to get a newer SSD (they no longer list an SSD for the Prosignia 500) that is for the 740 Server (their tech support says that any SSD for the servers will work) and it says it can't run without a service pack.

Totally confused and lost. Beginning to hate Compaq hardware. I have reloaded/used NT 4.0 for a very long time and never had this many problems installing. Typically, I can do an NT reload in my sleep.

Where can you get the latest SSD. What part of that do you actually run after the service pack is installed but before you reboot.

Any help is greatly appreciated. Please email willhud@bnbch.com.

[Ayman Altounji]

Additional Information.

I just did Service Pack 4 instead of 6a. I minimized the reboot screen(not sure about the ESC'ing out. The only option is to restart. I ran the following (I am assuming this is the SSD per tech support).

From the Compaq Smart Start CD V 3.20A. I go to CPQSUPSW\NTSSD and run setup.exe. One tech told me to run NTSSD.exe but that doesn't exist on the CD.

Anyway, I run the setup. I choose Express (perhaps this is where I screw up) and it told me that the Compaq Management Driver needed to be installed or upgraded. I allowed it to do that. It then wanted to reboot.

Should that be all that gets upgraded?

[Ayman Altounji]

The compaq tech support person found the following MS article Q223029 at microsoft. It describes the problem, and says to get a firmware upgrade from Compaq, but he is unsure as to what upgrade.

[Ayman Altounji]

Which SCSI controller are you using? I had NT4 on my ProSignia 500 running native NT drivers and took it as far as SP5 without problems. At that time I had the 4.3 Gb disks on the integrated SCSI. I've since upgraded it to 2K with 18Gb disks on an Adaptec card, again without problems.

If it works until you load the service pack, it's likely that you're overwriting the disk driver with an incompatible one, if you were using a driver from the SmartStartCD, the service pack install should warn you before overwriting and give you a choice.

As a last resort - you might want to try a different SCSI controller.