TR Forums

I recently got a mini-PC and, being me, decided to dual-boot Windows XP. Unfortunately that isn't going well. Whether I boot from the XP CD or from an OS configured on a different system, on OS startup I get a 7e STOP BSOD complaining about acpi.sys. What little useful information I could find on the internet pinned the blame on uncooperative motherboard BIOS but unfortunately the BIOS has no useful ACPI settings (or much else for that matter) and Gigabyte has refused to do anything about it. I've tried this with both XP and Server 2003, both of which fail, as well as Win7 and some Linux Live distros, all of which are able to boot.

Any ideas on things to try? I'm at a loss, as I was under the apparently erroneous belief that ACPI was one of those things that Just Works(tm) on any PC made after the year 2000. Data loss and system integrity are non-issues, this is an experimental rig so fool's errands are welcome.

Force a different hal at install time:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/299340

And no, acpi isn't something that 'just works'. Linux especially in the past didn't cope well with lousy BIOSes, although that seems to have been improved. Windows is usually OK probably because that's all the OEM cares about working, but if it's too old it could claim to be acpi yet be broken, or too new and buggy in a way win 7 tolerates but xp doesn't.

Make sure you pick standard PC or MPs if it is a dual or more for CPU.

Oh yes, forgot to mention that...tried legacy HAL install and got a different, generic BSOD at the same point in the startup process.

It's a Bay Trail box so old age isn't a factor, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if the bios has problems. Version 1.0 and I've seen more config options in embedded SBCs...

NovusBogus wrote:

It's a Bay Trail box so old age isn't a factor, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if the bios has problems. Version 1.0 and I've seen more config options in embedded SBCs...

Age could very well be a factor -- the age of the OS. Given that Bay Trail was released just months before XP went EOL, it is likely they did not test the system with XP at all.

Call me crazy, but isn't ACPI a standard? It's system states like C1E, S1 sleep etc - which are near-universal these days.

A new board may support more states than an old XP-era board but I would have though it'd still need to support the original ones too, because as time has passed there have become more advanced states.
JBI is probably right in that it's buggy and untested with XP because XP isn't worth the effort, but since ACPI controls power try disabling all the power-saving features you can find in the BIOS.

Another (probably fruitless) possibility is that AHCI is buggy for an OS that old, becaise AHCI ties into ACPI and is often the cause of OS-boot bluescreens on older operating systems. If it's okay to trash the second OS, try putting the SATA mode to "IDE" instead of ACHI.

If all else fails just install an OS where you can run a VirtualXP like 7 or 8.

Chrispy_ wrote:

Call me crazy, but isn't ACPI a standard? It's system states like C1E, S1 sleep etc - which are near-universal these days.

A new board may support more states than an old XP-era board but I would have though it'd still need to support the original ones too, because as time has passed there have become more advanced states.
JBI may be right in that it's buggy and untested with XP because XP isn't worth the effort, but since ACPI controls power try disabling all the power-saving features you can find in the BIOS.

Another (probably fruitless) possibility is that XP isn't understanding AHCI properly, which ties into ACPI and is often the cause of OS-boot bluescreens on older operating systems. If it's okay to trash the second OS, try putting the SATA mode to "IDE" instead of ACHI.

ACPI is many different standards - http://www.acpi.info/

the earlier of which are not likely supported as well in new kit.

Oh well, that means my other suggestions probably won't work either :\

I'd still think he ought to check the UEFI for any settings that might be affecting it like HPET/APIC/AHCI stuff, but I honestly don't know XP well enough to say. I know it doesn't support AHCI at all OOTB, but I don't know what else can affect it.

I don't know about ACPI, but I know for sure that I had a couple boards that needed AHCI storage drivers loaded off a floppy for Windows XP, much the same way you would for a RAID controller.

Savyg wrote:

I'd still think he ought to check the UEFI for any settings that might be affecting it like HPET/APIC/AHCI stuff, but I honestly don't know XP well enough to say. I know it doesn't support AHCI at all OOTB, but I don't know what else can affect it.

See if in addition to booting to standard mode... to see if there is a "drive compatibility mode" or "IDE mode for sata". They may have renamed the ACPI function or buried it in the drive configuration settings like dell does

Windows XP in a new deployment: just say no. Seriously. Besides the security problems no hardware manufacturer's going to bother validating their new drivers or firmware on an unsupported OS because that takes time and money that won't be recouped.

Give up on the idea and move on.

It's kind of a baffling choice to install XP without a particular, very good reason... That said, how old is the version of XP on the disc? Trying an original gold master disc won't work on anything hemispherically modern because the kernel freaks out on seeing PCI Express devices. You'd have a much better chance of success with at least Service Pack 2 slipstreamed on, and at this point it should be easy to obtain or make an install disc with all released patches and service packs included. If that doesn't work, consider virtualizing within an OS that hasn't been orphaned.

I wouldn't recommend XP on anything anymore, not even VMs unless some legacy software requires it.

If you absolutely must have Windows XP (as Concupiscence already pointed out) use an updated install disc. Microsoft offered direct iso downloads for XP SP3 and I'd recommend burning one of those to disc. SP2 in the very least.... Any vanilla XP and XP SP1 install media is pretty much useless on modern hardware.