Windows 7 Another 'freezes at Completing Installation' thread

sreenath

New Member
This is honestly ridiculous I see like millions of these threads, what is wrong with Microsoft? This is supposed to be user-friendly. I am relatively savvy but this problem has proven to be extremely difficult and obscure.

I am a CS student so I got a download and valid serial of Win 7 Pro from MSDNAA. I burned it, and everytime I try to install it freezes at the very end, at the Completing Installation part.

I have read the forums and tried the following:
Turning on SATA ACHI in bios and verifying that SATA is in native mode
Keeping all USB unplugged, in fact nothing but Power PS/2 and Monitor(DVI)
Flashing my BIOS to the latest version

The next thing I am going to try is to load drivers. How do I actually do this? Do I need to burn drivers to a cd then insert it or what? In another thread the same nvidia driver that is for my card is suggested to fix the problem by loading it into the install. So I just want to know how to load it. Also do I need to load SATA/audio drivers?

Specs:
Gigabyte GA-P965-S3 rev1.0 with new F14 BIOS
2GB OCZ PC6400 Ram at normal voltage
Intel C2D E6400 at stock speed
GeForce 7600GT video card
PC P&C 610W Silencer, 500GB SATA HDD, 20x DVD+-RW drive
 
You are certainly right about there being many threads concerning this situation. I am guessing you did not find anything that helped.

I have read the forums and tried the following:
Turning on SATA ACHI in bios and verifying that SATA is in native mode
Keeping all USB unplugged, in fact nothing but Power PS/2 and Monitor(DVI)
Flashing my BIOS to the latest version
I do not know why folks would recommend going to AHCI. This is an advanced controller and might be good for large hard drives, but I would not think it would solve a problem the IDE mode could not handle.

Unplugging everything you can is good info, and running only one monitor also.

It is always good to have a current bios. Did you follow the directions if it said to restore bios defaults when the install was finished?

Basically you need to eliminate everything that might need a driver to run. In the bios, you can disable the network adapter, if it is on the motherboard. Maybe sound also and anything else you do not need for the install.

Some folks suggest using the minimum memory you can.

I don't think it would work, but you might try removing the Install DVD prior to the problem area.
The thought is maybe Windows has changed modes and cannot read the DVD any more.

If it is a video driver problem, you may be able to set the install to use the basic video to install and also ignore the driver signing. I have not personally done this, but you may need to hit F8 during the first part after a reboot to access this area.

Are you doing a 64 or 32 bit version, and have you tried the other one?
 
Thank you for your reply!!

[Background]
OK so yes I did flash my BIOS to the latest version, for some people this alone caused them to no longer hang up on the Completing Install screen anymore. Just for reference for other people who have this problem, there are many solutions which worked for many people (Just not me!) they might work for you.

One other thing mentioned is to not format and press next on the partition, rather delete->new so a 100MB system partition is made as well...this didnt change anything for me either

A third 'fix' for some people who had this problem was a crude one but apparently it worked for many many people, just not me T_T. You Shift+F10 when it is hanging up and start explorer.exe. It will do a bunch of stuff then freeze; you hard-reset it and apparently that worked for people as strange as that sounds lolol...but yeah didn't work for me.
[ / Background]

I have only PS/2, Power, and Monitor plugged in at the moment.
When I get home my plan is to start by disabling anything else that might POSSIBLY need a driver:
-onboard Gigabit LAN controller
-onboard audio

For my Graphics card (mobo has no onboard video) When i tried to Load its driver (the latest version of it) during install using the 'Load Driver' and selecting my flash drive/the nvidia driver (it recognized it right away)...it didn't work. It said "could not load driver. Get a new driver from manufacturer" or something to that effect. o_O -.- ... it was the latest driver. anyway What else/how else can i get around the video card driver, you suggested maybe disabling that aspect and forcing it to use the generic video driver by pressing F8 when it restarts, or when? when it restarts the first time or?
 
do i really have to go out and buy some new media to reburn or can i try installing it from a usb flash drive instead. because that could be the problem. but i know my ISO is perfect it was downloaded straight from MSDNAA.
 
do i really have to go out and buy some new media to reburn or can i try installing it from a usb flash drive instead. because that could be the problem. but i know my ISO is perfect it was downloaded straight from MSDNAA.
As Reghakr is saying, there is probably nothing wrong with the ISO, but you just need to burn it at a very slow speed. All of my ISOs come from TechNet, and I use ImgBurn (which is free by the way) at burn it at 1x or 4x, seems to keep subsequent problems from happening. The Official ImgBurn Website
 
i have to say, im sorry and thanks for your help but really I should've known that advice was whack...yeah it didnt help and of course there was nothing wrong with the disk...how could i have even thought that and wasted so much valuable time. i mean it was obviously the issue that other people had even with the stock install disk rather than my own unique 'bad disk' issue...i should have specified that I am looking for an actual fix like "needing to include driver" or "shift+f10 and do something in dos"

anyway...i burned it at 1x on expensive media for no reason whatsoever. made absolutely no difference. Then I did the USB flash drive install method perfectly and same thing happened.

this is seriously pathetic. this shouldn't happen to anyone for installing an os...there is no logical reason for this error.
 
Have you copied all your important files to a flash drive?

You could try downloading GParted and wipe out all partitions,

Then create a 60GB partition for Windows 7 and try the install again.

If it works, go to Start > Run, and type diskmgmt,msc and create more partitions for your 3rd party programs and music, videos, and Pictures if you collect a lot of them

Download GParted here:
http://gparted.sourceforge.net/download.php
 
what is the relevance of any of that ... can you give me an actual reason you think I should do that and why that would overcome the problem that I'm having.
 
That would completely wipe out everything on your hard drive.

Essentially, just like having a new hard drive.

There could have been some files on the hard drive that may have been causing the problem.

Just trying to help you get Windows 7 up and running.
 
Thank you for your reply!!

[Background]A third 'fix' for some people who had this problem was a crude one but apparently it worked for many many people, just not me T_T. You Shift+F10 when it is hanging up and start explorer.exe.
I ran across the starting explorer.exe thing and for me it presented a small window that showed what was going on in the background. You have to wait until after the last boot after it has loaded updates. In the command window you can also start msconfig.exe or taskmgr.exe if it might help.

Once in a while I will get the EMS screen with an option to use basic video. This happens it seems if I hit the space bar repeadidly during the boot to DVD message. It does go back to a Windows loading files again, but it seems it continues the install. There is a base video option here, but I do not know if it works.

You might also try booting to the Install DVD and on the second screen select repair. From repair, go to the command prompt and type the following and hit enter after each line.

bootrec /fixmbr
bootrec /fixboot

close the window and reboot.

If nothing else works, maybe get a cheap video card to try with.

As you can tell, I really do not know a good answer. I cannot test if I can't get my system to do as yours.

I will keep my ears open for a fix and post back if I find one and you are still having problems.
 
Back
Top