Inspiron 600m - Restore w/o Disk

First things first - the system won't support a 250G partition.  You CAN use a 250G drive IF you make a first, 120G or smaller partition on it for Windows.  Once you've got Windows installed, you can create a second partition for data that uses the rest of the drive.  If you try to use a single 250G partition for Windows, you will one day turn the system on and receive a "disc read error" and lose everything on the drive.

If you have a copy of Symantec Ghost (or Acronis True Image - the paid version ) you can read and restore the gho file from an external drive.  

Otherwise you need a Dell Windows CD and will need to do a clean install from the ground up (subject to the 120G BIOS limitation).

If you want to restore a ghost file, you're going to need the paid version of TrueImage or Ghost.

I have partitioned the new drive accordingly. Just wondered how to restore the Ghost image file to the C drive.

I have Acronis True Image for WD, but not the PAID version. Did not want to have to pay Acronis, but rather pay for that then Symantec.

Any other suggestions?

Thanks!

First, you MUST use an OEM Dell disc - the key won't work with any other WIndows disc.  And since your Dell disc will be pre-activated, you won't even need the license key to do the install.

trueimage didnt' work - said the ghost file was not the last one.

Either it can't use or read GHO files or the files were corrupted.

Will try to install WinXP with a valid install disk , but not sure how to use the WinXP Keys on the bottom of the laptop.

Any ideas?

Thanks!