I was stuck in the win 7 set-up on the partition section but took a tip from this thread and deleted the partition. This allowed me to create a new partition (lifting the "grey out" from the "new" option) and I was able to get all the way up to the key entry.
Thanks for clearing that up.
It's not a "partition block" per se. Windows 7 does not like to be installed into an existing partition (to prevent installing an OS directly over another). Consequently you have to delete a partition to get "unpartitioned space" which Windows 7 will install into without complaint provided it's big enough.
Here, this one works great:
http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html
please dont waste 100$, I hate seeing people waste 100$
Pardon me being an idiot but whats the point of that?
OK, so the problem now is that your motherboard's drive controller isn't supported by the OS install disk(how it is, for AMD). You need to create a disk/thumbdrive with the AHCI drivers before you can install the OS, or switch the drive controller to "IDE" mode. This is why it was having issues creating the partition to install the OS.
By OS install disc I assume you mean Windows XP disc. The Windows 7 disc, by contrast, already has AHCI drivers and installs fine on every modern chipset I've tried. Slipstreaming drivers may be non-trivial for Thlorian as it does involve several steps and often the use of tools like nLite. On the other hand switching the controller to IDE mode is a decent fix to the problem (IMO).
If you don't mind here's my thoughts on the topic:
-Older 'upgrade' discs (XP & 2000 amongst them) only asked for a previous Windows disc before doing a proper fresh install
-Newer 'upgrade' discs (Vista and 7) need a HD with an installed version of Winblows
-He has a full 2000, an XP upgrade and a Win7 Upgrade disc
Therefore I would switch the controller to IDE, install XP and use the 2000 disc to get the installer to pass the 'upgrade' test. Then I would switch the controller back to AHCI then run the Windows 7 upgrade disc and it will see that XP is installed so it will (presumably) work without any hitches. Done.
Where did I go wrong?