Solving the UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME

by Walt Stoneburner

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The Symptom

When trying to install a Microsoft operating, whether Windows 2003 or Windows XP, from DVD, you get an UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME blue screen of death. No matter what you try, it won't go away.

Your system definately meets the minimum requirements.

Solution: It's Not What You Think

Microsoft has a knowledge base article about the problem, naturally, you've tried it and it's completely useless.

The problem is that there's a read error, not necessarily a write error. Furthermore, the problem may not be with the hard drive, but is more likely with the device that has the source media.

In my case it was the DVD drive that was having read problems. CDs worked, but something with a higher density, like a full DVD ROM produced errors.

Replacing the DVD drive solved the problem.