Installation Problem

Well, I decided to go ahead & install Windows 8 on my test machine. I ran the compatibility tool which told me I was good to go save for a few minor bits of incompatible software. The tool then took me to the order page where I made my purchase, downloaded the upgrade & began the actual installation.

The machine rebooted & the installation resumed. It asked if I wanted to D/L the pre-release update & I gave it the go-ahead. Once that finished, the installer indicated that it was checking a few things, suddenly popped up a message saying that my machine was incapable of running Windows 8 & promptly terminated.

I tried restarting things from the ISO & it says that I need to insert the 32 bit DVD which I don't have because this was a download.

Any suggestions?

 

Been There, Done That

Steve,
Believe me; that's the first thing I tried. That's when it asked me to insert the 32-bit DVD.

 

Hi , you have a link in the thank you email from MS that enables the ordering of the "personal backup dvd"
Interesting the find out what spec was unsupported.

 

Hi. I took your suggestion & ordered a copy of the DVD. I've been waiting for it to turn up here. So far, no joy.

 

At Last!!!

Finally! The DVD arrived on Wed. & I was - after considerable difficulty - to upgrade to Windows 8.

The first 4 or 5 times I started the update, it got as far as the checking for "updates" screen
& then said that it couldn't install Win 8 so I'd need to restart the process. After the 5th try, I un-ticked the "Search for Updates" box as well as the one that permits collecting information for Microsoft.

On this go-round, it got past that point & started doing the actual installation. Was it going to go all the way? In a word: No. It got as far as the point where you pick the background colour of the interface formerly known as Metro and told me that an error had occurred & it was going to roll back everything to Windows 7. The roll-back included automatically running CHKDISK on the next boot. It found a relatively small # of problems & fixed them. This time around, the installation went to completion - Huzzah! - and I promptly installed Classic Shell.

I can't say for certain if running CHKDISK helped any. What I can say is that the whole process took 5 to 6 hours.

I've already noticed one problem; I cannot type the @ sign into any web forms on Chrome or IE. I can type it somewhere else & then do a cut & paste.

 

Workaround: If you have a separate numerical keypad, while holding down the [Alt] key, type 64 on the numerical keypad, then release the [Alt] key. That should produce an "@" symbol for you.

 

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll give it a try. Any idea why it's doing this in Win 8?

 

You're welcome.

Nope, sure don't. Hopefully someone else with an idea or two will drop in here shortly.

 

There's at least 2 other Win 8 machines @ my part-time job. I'll stop by tomorrow to see if there is any commonality.

 

Doc,
It looks like its something w/ my machine. Everything worked fine w/ the box at work.

Howard

 

Works as it should here as well.

Did you try another keyboard?

Does it work OK plugged into another port?

Does it work in Safe mode?

Does that keyboard work OK on another computer?

 

Doc,
All good questions. All I can say is that the Keyboard works fine with another PC. It worked fine w/ the PC in question when it was a Win 7 machine.

I'll try another keyboard & safe mode as time permits

 

Doc,
I've learned 2 things since my last message:

1. It's not just the "@ ", it's all the numeric keys at the top of the keyboard. -= and - are unaffected as are the keys on the number pad to the right of the keyboard.

2. A different keyboard doesn't change things.

Howard

 

Same problem in Safe mode?

 

Testing in Safe Mode should happen later today.