XP Install

What controller is the drive connected to?
Some controllers require the driver to be loaded when booting up XP from the CD for installation.

Next, does the motherboard or IDE controller support the 80GB drive?

If the above doesn't help, please reject my answer and include all system hardware details in the comments.

Chas

Try going to the Maxtor website and download the H/D tools to set it up and troubleshoot it.

http://www.maxtor.com/en/support/products/ata/desktop/index.htm

HTH

Without knowing more specifics it's trick to find
out exacly what's going on, but you might want to try a different approach. Do a clean install. Go to Dos and Fdisk it and then format it. After you done formating, place the XP CD on the CD Tray, and reboot your PC. That should solve any error problems found. This way you won't even need to have use the Windows XP boot up diskettes at all.