The crystallization behavior of the a-Si:H films grown by hot wire chemical vapor deposition has been studied using X-ray diffraction (XRD) and reflectance spectroscopy. The surface morphology of the films does not change during annealing. It has been observed that the different deposition rates, hydrogen contents, or annealing processes do not affect the nucleation mechanism or orientation of the films differently. The full width at half maxima of the XRD (111) peak of high deposition rate (similar to 100 angstrom/s) films is observed to decrease when the same completely crystallized films (at 650 degrees C) are treated at increased temperatures up to 900 degrees C. Furthermore, films with different hydrogen contents and grown at a lower deposition rate (similar to 5 angstrom/s) showed similar crystal growth activation energies upon rapid thermal annealing. (c) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.