installation hangs after restart

I purchased the Windows Vista Beta 2 DVD from Microsoft, and had no problems installing until it had to restart. When it restarts, I get the Vista blue background and some text that says "Installing Windows...". However, there is no PC activity and the DVD drive stops spinning. I kept it on this screen for 30 minutes and nothing happens. Any ideas? Any help is appreciated.
Also, I cannot run installation through the DVD on bootup, the same thing happens. The blue background and nothing happens. I have to start the installation through XP to get it going.

I am not sure if this is a device issue, but here's some guidance if you want to report a bug:
Finding setup logs, reporting and attaching logs to report, figuring out what device or driver causes hangs or crash during setup:
1. google -> beta client click the first link. It needs .NET but I think it will be installed if you try to run it without it..
2. finding and identifying the correct logs
setupapi.app.log setupapi.dev.log <<-- last 20 lines here may indicate hanging driver
These are the primary setup logs, there are others but these are the major.
Hint: Before searching logs try Folder Options and enable viewing of hidden folders and files. Also try Run diskmgmt.msc -> assign drive letters for partitions with no drive letters.
A:
There can be multiple logs with the same name, but they are different! First look at the drive you tried to install Vista to, if it has Vista Windows\INF\ directory and the mentioned logs files.
B: early setup failure
If you can't find Windows VISTA directory (if setup did not get so far) then look all volumes/partitions in the drives that were on the machine during the install for directories starting with $. There are 2-4 of them (possibly in different partitions) depending on when the setup failed. Search for .log under all the *:\$WINDOWS.. and again look at the date/minute timestamp to see which of the logs was changed just before the failure occured.
Also ee that the date and Minute timestamp of the log files are around the time when the setup failed, sometimes a setup/install failure causes the computer to automatically reboot and the setup will run again but failing in different way than the first time (making the bug report less useful). For best bug report it's better to catch the failure when it first happens. Yes it means starting the install all over again and keeping eye on it. But this will guarantee that the last line in the log will be around the time of the failure. If it is a driver crash then you can figure out the offending driver yourself just by looking at the last twenty or so lines of setupapi.dev.log.
"ironj221" wrote in message

I purchased the Windows Vista Beta 2 DVD from Microsoft, and had no problems installing until it had to restart. When it restarts, I get the Vista blue background and some text that says "Installing Windows...". However, there is no PC activity and the DVD drive stops spinning. I kept it on this screen for 30 minutes and nothing happens. Any ideas? Any help is appreciated.
Also, I cannot run installation through the DVD on bootup, the same thing happens. The blue background and nothing happens. I have to start the installation through XP to get it going.

Also try disconneting every external device. It might be hanging on some devices which have buggy drivers in vista image. Strip everything down, try again and start adding them one by one back. Also i would check if my bios is uptodate and bios settings. -- Try, learn, experience.
"ironj221" wrote:

I purchased the Windows Vista Beta 2 DVD from Microsoft, and had no problems installing until it had to restart. When it restarts, I get the Vista blue background and some text that says "Installing Windows...". However, there is no PC activity and the DVD drive stops spinning. I kept it on this screen for 30 minutes and nothing happens. Any ideas? Any help is appreciated.
Also, I cannot run installation through the DVD on bootup, the same thing happens. The blue background and nothing happens. I have to start the installation through XP to get it going.