Manually Installing Windows Xp

Question

Simply, I am trying to restore my Dell Mini 10. Windows XP SP3 successfully installs... looks and works great, but apparently not enough! (No, I do not press "Hit any key to boot CD" the second time.).

YET, my drivers and utilities disk does not read, and is unable to install once computer is up and running. (This is everything! This is driving me crazy because I have reinstalled my OS about four times already just trying to figure out why I can't get to STEP 2: Installing Drivers and Utilities.

First off my questions/statements that may help you help me are:

1) Does it have to do with with the fact I did NOT erase FAT 32 Partition 1? (I kept it because I wanted to follow instructions on Microsoft by only touching by C: NTFS drive)

2) It has nothing to do with the Utilities and Drivers Disk, this is the 2nd one I received from Dell, as I requested earlier this week, due to the fact that they show up as empty in their drives on My Computer.

3) I need the internet and cannot get it at-all because of the drivers and utilities disk. HELP. Please!

fireberd · Answer

Have you tried reinstalling using the Dell recovery partition? If you have F11 on the keyboard (some mini models do not) CTRL/F11 at power on for systems with XP. The Dell recovery partition will allow you to completely restore to factory condition and no discs are needed.

The FAT partitions will not keep you from manually installing. If Windows is not seeing any discs it would appear the external USB drive is not being detected correctly by Windows XP. Are you connecting the drive before or after Windows XP starts? that COULD be a cause of XP not detecting the drive correctly.

You may want to also post this in the Laptop general hardware section as someone there may have some suggestions on how to get it working in your mini. I have a mini laptop but its a Samsung with Win 7 and it works a little different on a reinstall.

cbonggat · Answer

Fireberd:

Thanks for the advice.

The external USB drive is working. That is how I installed WIndows XP in the first place, through a disc.

However, the Utilities and Drivers Disc is not working and if you read my previous HELP letter, it is not the Utilities Disc either.

Thanks for letting me know that FAT32 is not the issue.

My concern now is does F11 still work once you have wiped everything out on your disc. I have tried it many times, but I figure it is because my computer is 'clean' it has nothing to revert back to. *I have already wiped out my computer for the previous install when installing Windows XP through the SP3 disc.*

Any other suggestions?

fireberd · Answer

If the Dell recovery partition was corrupted (and installing an OS or OS version other than the original usually does corrupt it) there is no user way to recover.

The thing with the CD drive and reading from it. When you first boot the, BIOS is controlling the drive. But when you try to read from a drive in Windows then Windows is controlling it. Two different control points.

It looks like a "catch 22" and I'm not sure how to get around this. You need the motherboard chipset drivers (assuming there are drivers) before the USB ports can be used in Windows. But, since you can't read from the drive in Windows you can't install the chipset drivers.

Have you tried starting in Safe Mode and see if you can read/install from Safe Mode? To access Safe Mode, F8 BEFORE Windows starts, select Safe Mode (no networking) from the menu.

You may have to call Dell and get assistance from them. If it's out of warranty you will have to "bite the bullet" for the support charges.

cbonggat · Answer

Do you know anyway I can make it run from CMD to load the drive?  Is this possible.     P.s.  My 32-bit diagnostic test was successful with no errors.

cbonggat · Answer

Fireberd:

Thanks again.

I don't know if it is corrupted but I did use the exact same OS disc that it came with when I first bought it about a year ago. Like I said, it runs fine but doesn't read so it sucks.

Right now I am doing a diagnostic test.

I will try running it in safe mode to run the Resource Disc and see how that works. I hope it does. I will let you know!

fireberd · Answer

DOS does not recognize an NTFS formatted hard drive and the drivers have to be installed under Windows (Windows running).

Windows General

Manually Installing Windows Xp

Was this post helpful?