INVALID LINE ... IN INF FILE during Windows NT Setup

ID: Q174264

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Windows NT Workstation versions 3.5, 3.51, 4.0
Microsoft Windows NT Server versions 3.5, 3.51, 4.0

SYMPTOMS

When you perform either an unattended or regular Windows NT setup, you may receive the following error message:

INVALID LINE X IN INF FILE

Where X is usually the numeral 1 or 2 but could be any number.

CAUSE

There may be a hardware failure or an improper CMOS setting that causes the Winnt.sif or Txtsetup.sif file to get corrupted during the file copy portion of setup.

This may also be caused by fragmentation on the local drive, bad copy across the network, or you may have a typographical error in the Unattend.txt configuration file.

RESOLUTION

This error message may be generated by one of several problems at a hardware level:

Check the CMOS settings for the computer and verify all settings are correct. You may need to reset the CMOS setting back to factory defaults.

Check for a L2 cache failure (if it's a Pentium pro machine the L2 cache is built in on the processor).

Check for bad or mismatched RAM Memory SIMM Modules.

Remove adapter cards such as NIC, Modems, Sound cards that are not required for booting.

If all the above fail to detect the problem, there may be a problem with the motherboard.

If an error is received about any other line being invalid, for example: INVALID LINE 346 IN INF FILE, an actual setup file may be corrupt. Most Likely this file could be a corrupt Unattend.txt file in either Windows NT 3.51 or Windows NT 4.0. In each case, recreating Unattend.txt using Setupmgr.exe will fix the problem.

Additional query words: unattend information


Keywords          : kbsetup ntsetup NTSrvWkst 
Version           : WinNT:3.5,3.51,4.0
Platform          : winnt 
Issue type        :

Last Reviewed: January 16, 1999