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Some news about the "The system is not fully installed. Please run setup again" error message during reboot of the newly cloned hard drive...

Another (completely different) hardware, another hard drive, the same error shows up. Still no Mini-setup showing, only what seems the "drivers install" phase (since all drivers are installed upon next reboot, after setting the "SystemSetupInProgress" registry value).

Since the error doesn't indicate anything useful, i don't know whether it may be caused by the fact that "Documents and settings" are put onto another partition (D:\) during the "before-sysprep" phase (it's done by modifying some registry keys, right after the first complete boot following a fresh Windows XP install) ?
Still investigating...

Well, thanks for your input, OverFlow... Though it doesn't help me with the issue i have, it's interesting.

I think i get it : "you hate sysprep". Ok. But how to achieve the same without it ?
Lookint at your post (#51 of the present thread), i see you recommend to make an Unattended Windows XP CD, with slipstreamed patches and drivers (nLite / RVM).
My matter is, i'm using localized (french) version of Windows XP, so i can't use RVM (please correct me if i'm wrong on this). Finding out what patches i need to make a clean and fully updated UWXP CD is a task i don't have the time for (maybe i'm wrong on this point and it would be far easier than i think)

I also didn't catch the point : how and when do you install/configure all the software you want to be on your duplicated computers ? I think it's during the WPI phase, but can you confirm me that EVERY software will make it ? To be more precise, here are the softwares i usually install : 7-zip, Adobe Reader, Audacity, CDBurnerXP, CDEx, Mozilla Firefox / Thunderbird / Sunbird, Adobe Flash & Shockwave plug-ins, QT Lie, Real Alternative Lite, Media Filters Pack, PhotoFiltre, Gilp, Google Earth, Stelarium, Java, JkDefrag, OpenOffice and its (french) dictionnaries, , MS PowerPoint Viewer, Scribus, UndeletePlus, Skype, Windows Live Messenger, SuperCopier, The KMPlayer, utorrent, WinAmp & XnView.

About the time costs : if i can make the sysprep way to operate, i think i can have a ready-to-operate new unit in less than an hour, all included - duplicate partitions with ntfsclone, chkdsk 'em, put the HDD in the case, switch on the device and making all the not automated things manually (for an example, i set a toolbar in the system Windows bar, which is a "link" to a folder on the user's desktop : for now, i didn't find the way to automate the creation of this toolbar... ?).
It may be twice (or more) the time you need, but it already vould be far better than the present situation (installing everything from sractch takes me something like 5 to 6 hours per unit). OK, that's no good reason to keep using sysprep.

Please forgive my logorrhea, i may be a little over-exhausted... Thanks for your attention, though !

Oops, I did it again...
Some news, so.

I just rebuilt the before-sysprep-state (thanks to Linux ntfsclone).
Then I modified sysprep.inf, adding a [Display] section so the vertical refresh is no more a problem.
Next, ROE'd then resealed the install, and "ntfscloned" it to a partition onto another hard drive.
Since the partition sizes are not the same (the original one is smaller than the destination one), i had to run a chkdsk onto that partition (from another XP install, through an USB HD case), before setting up the HD into its final case.
chkdsk was fine (recovered some space marked as used into the MFT, which seems pretty OK to me).
The computer booted, ran into Mini-Setup, and soon gave me the "The system is not fully installed. Please run setup again" error message (the kb is right there).

I'm completely stuck at this point : fixing the "SystemSetupInProgress" registry DWORD will probably lead to the same behaviour : slooooow startup, then the "almost-no-started-services" syndrom.

I'll go through it, and report in there.

Thanks for attention and any suggestion (besides "You should work on your written english", thanks) !

EDIT. I checked the "SystemSetupInProgress" registry value on the "before-sysprep" state : it is set to 0, and then set to 1 (which causes a problem) during the Mini-setup. I really don't know why such a thing happens, though.

EDIT #2 :
- Don't know why, but the ROE before reseal adds "D:\DPsFnshr.exe" into RunOnceEx... I saw it during after the ROE during first attempt, and corrected it into the registry before resealing. Maybe that's because "Documents and settings" are on drive "D" in the install i made ?
- Except for the vertical refresh part, I get exactly the same behaviour with the modified sysprep : no Mini-Setup, and then the "almost-no-started-services" syndrom.

EDIT #3. By the way, it is strange to me, but i do have a vertical refresh problem into safe mode ("Video mode not supported" displayed by the LCD). How is it possible, since the sysprep.inf [Display] section seems to work, and i encounter nothing similar onto the "before-sysprep" state ?!