Problem
You are performing a clean installation of Windows 7 (any version) and experience the following error at some point during the installation:
Discussion
All of these issues point to a possible problem with the hard disk and likely involves the failure of one or more sectors on the disk. While the hard disk is likely the culprit, and it may degrade further, it is still possible to recover the use of your machine without the purchase of any new software or hardware. This article shows you how.
You will need your system recovery disk.
The primary method for accomplishing this is to isolate the problem. Most of the hard drive is likely still functional. You just need to configure the hard drive in such a way that the operating system will neither be installed to nor operate using those sectors. You accomplish this through appropriate partitioning.
Rather than trying to re-install your system to the drive configured as a single partition, you will instead create multiple partitions on the hard drive with the intent of capturing those bad sectors within one of those partitions and using the other partition as your system partition.
The Windows 7 installation enables you to create and delete partitions during the installation process. You don't know where the bad sectors may lie, whether they are towards the outer rim of the disk or inner portions, so you'll need to progressively work your way inwards with partitions of varying sizes, until you create a partition set that isolates the problem and allows you to perform the installation without issue.
Take, for example, a 3-year old (just out of warranty) laptop having a 450 GB hard disk. Try creating two partitions, each 225 GB. Format the partitions. Now, install the system to the first partition. If the installation proceeds without issue, you have successfully isolated the sector failure to the second partition. If it doesn't, try to repeat the installation attempt to the second partition. If this succeeds, you've successfully isolated the issue to the first partition. Otherwise, you may have found the issue midway on the disk.
Continue this process, trying different partition sizes, until you can get the installation to proceed without issue. Once the system is installed, you can perform a disk check using Windows tools in order to recover the bad partition.
This article has discussed one method for possibly recoverying from Error code 0x80FF0000, if experienced during clean installation. It provides a least-cost method of recovery, enabling you to regain the use of the system, if temporarily, without the purchase of new software or hardware.
References
You are performing a clean installation of Windows 7 (any version) and experience the following error at some point during the installation:
Windows could not set the offline locale information. Error code 0x80FF0000You then attempt to repeat the installation, but experience the same error, though it may occur at somewhat different points during the installation process. You were able to re-partition and even format the target drive during the installation process without issue. Other possible experiences you may have had with this machine prior to this error include:
- Suddenly displayed a blue screen, without warning. On restart, BIOS would load fine, but then became stuck during Windows loading.
- Suddenly loaded extremely slowly or even remained stuck in the Windows loading phase of the boot process.
Discussion
All of these issues point to a possible problem with the hard disk and likely involves the failure of one or more sectors on the disk. While the hard disk is likely the culprit, and it may degrade further, it is still possible to recover the use of your machine without the purchase of any new software or hardware. This article shows you how.
You will need your system recovery disk.
The primary method for accomplishing this is to isolate the problem. Most of the hard drive is likely still functional. You just need to configure the hard drive in such a way that the operating system will neither be installed to nor operate using those sectors. You accomplish this through appropriate partitioning.
Rather than trying to re-install your system to the drive configured as a single partition, you will instead create multiple partitions on the hard drive with the intent of capturing those bad sectors within one of those partitions and using the other partition as your system partition.
The Windows 7 installation enables you to create and delete partitions during the installation process. You don't know where the bad sectors may lie, whether they are towards the outer rim of the disk or inner portions, so you'll need to progressively work your way inwards with partitions of varying sizes, until you create a partition set that isolates the problem and allows you to perform the installation without issue.
Take, for example, a 3-year old (just out of warranty) laptop having a 450 GB hard disk. Try creating two partitions, each 225 GB. Format the partitions. Now, install the system to the first partition. If the installation proceeds without issue, you have successfully isolated the sector failure to the second partition. If it doesn't, try to repeat the installation attempt to the second partition. If this succeeds, you've successfully isolated the issue to the first partition. Otherwise, you may have found the issue midway on the disk.
Continue this process, trying different partition sizes, until you can get the installation to proceed without issue. Once the system is installed, you can perform a disk check using Windows tools in order to recover the bad partition.
NOTE: Given the fact that this hard disk has likely evidenced sector failure once, it is even more likely to do so again in the future. Thus, the recovery procedure discussed here is a temporary measure.Summary
This article has discussed one method for possibly recoverying from Error code 0x80FF0000, if experienced during clean installation. It provides a least-cost method of recovery, enabling you to regain the use of the system, if temporarily, without the purchase of new software or hardware.
References
