Can't install 64 bit vista
 

So I'm trying to install 64 bit vista with sp1 on the system to make a dual boot, but I can't do it because the installation process itself won't start. I already have 32-bit version of XP installed and I've put CDROM booting priority in the BIOS. The problem is that the screen says press any key to boot from CD/DVD but when I do that nothing happens and windows XP boot as always.

My specs are:
AMD Athlon x2 6000+
4GB RAM
640GB Hitachi HD
2x LG DVD
Gigabyte motherboard (not sure 'bout the model)
etc.

There's two possible reasons:

a) your BIOS doesn't activate your USB keyboard before entering Windows so that your key presses are not captured since the keyboard isn't active yet

b) you got a bad CD/DVD and while your BIOS may detect it as a bootable CD/DVD, once it reads it, it may decide it's not bootable anyway and continue to Windows XP.

this happened to me when the copy of my windows cd was scratched, did you try another cd?

Well it detects the copy in windows XP normally. Also I just *khm* used a flamethrower on it so it should be fine.

@red_avatar: it detects my keyboard when I press del to enter BIOS, I would expect for it to detect my keyboard afterwards too, no?

You sure your CPU itself is 64 bits? :p

Otherwise it seems to point that the CD isn't bootable--including that it was but the boot sector was damaged, even if data elsewhere are intact...

Reading a CD and reading the boot data is two different things. Also, is this a legal version? You can't burn a bootable image from an ISO file for example and incorrectly burning any image file may result in a non-bootable DVD.

Of course my CPU is 64 bit, all the modern ones are and this one has two cores. Also it says it's 64-bit while booting. :P

Now what you're talking about ISO's might be the case, what can I do? Also when I've burnt my windows xp ISO's I would just burn them normally and they would boot.

you can, i did it gazillion times. why should booting from burned iso not work? all my systems are running from a back up version burned from an ISO

btw tulac, i meant if you tried another version of vista cd, not xp cd..

Had to check the CPU. :P

An image is an exact image of the full disc AFAIK, boot data and more.

It may have been the burning software that didn't support bootable discs? And didn't write the booting data even though it may have been present in the image? Make sure the software you're using supports bootable discs and if not get another.

I'm using Nero 6.6, not sure if it supports it.

So it seems red_avatar was right, usb keyboard was disabled in the BIOS. But now I got an error during installation. AAAAGH