Member Avatar for steve0701

When installing XP on the ASUS EeePC 2GB Surf from an external CD all appears to go well until the first restart, then I get the Welcome to Setup screen again. The recovery console works, but how do I tell Setup to continue from where it left off?

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A repeated "Welcome to Setup" loop after the first reboot usually has two causes: the machine keeps booting back from the install CD instead of continuing from the hard disk, or the target disk/partition has corruption so Setup can’t pick up where it left off. and are right that XP normally restarts several times and will continue by itself — but that only holds when the installer actually boots the HDD and the on-disk files are intact. ’s post shows a classic disk-corruption case where a repair scan fixed the problem.

Practical checklist:

  • Prevent accidental booting from the CD: when the first phase finishes, do not press any key at the "boot from CD" prompt; alternatively remove/unplug the external CD drive or use the BIOS/boot-menu to make the HDD the next boot device. On small systems like the EeePC with USB optical drives this is a very common cause of a restart loop.
  • If Setup restarts and begins copying files from the CD again, run the Recovery Console (or other repair environment) and run a thorough disk-scan/repair to locate and fix corrupted files and bad sectors. Also check the SSD/HDD health (SMART or manufacturer tools) and run a memory test if problems persist.
  • Verify the install media and drivers: try a different burn/ISO or install from USB, and make sure XP has any needed mass-storage drivers for the target controller.

If fixes above fail, try installing to a different drive or slipstreaming drivers/service packs, and consider updating the BIOS. The key takeaway from this thread: don’t assume every restart is harmless — confirm you’re booting the HDD and confirm the target disk is healthy (as discovered).

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Member Avatar for wainrob

Where exactly did you left? When installing windows Xp it will undergo system restart, i guess about 3 times til it get to windows...

Member Avatar for compdoc

when you install windows xp and setup takes over, just let it go. after the first reboot dont touch anything it will continue on its own. it will let you know when to click or type anything when its needed.

Member Avatar for steve0701

Thanks for the replies, but when I posed the question I tried to make it clear that the entire installation process kept starting over from the very beginning- Setup takes 10 minutes collecting the same initial files and re-writing the same files to disk every time. Here is the solution that I discovered: From the recovery console I ran chkdsk /p and found that one file kept having a corruption problem. Running chkdsk /r fixed the file, and when XP restarted the next time it continued properly from where it left off and the entire installation eventually completed successfully.

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