Unsolved
This post is more than 5 years old
4 Posts
0
8539
November 30th, 2003 17:00
installing windows 2000 - HELP!
I`m trying to install windows 2000 pro on my laptop that I bought from DELL. It`s duel-booting windows 98 and ME on separate partitions, and The hard drive is rather small (im not sure how big, only a couple hundred mbs on each partition left). So, I want to reformat it and do a clean install of windows 2000 pro.
Anyhow, I thought it was going 2 be a walk in the park since I`ve done this a million times; with my desktops. Turns out that my friend has my CD-ROM drive with him, and he's all the way over in Wisconsin. I have an external USB CD-ROM drive with me, but when I run the setup, it won`t detect the external drive (probably cuz it USB). During setup, you can press F6 to load any SCSI drivers, but I don`t know if this drive is that kind...
So, I pressed it and tried my CD-ROM driver manufacterer disk. It apparently needs a file called `txtsetup.oem,` to work. I tried searching my computer for it, I`ve tried the setup diskettes. I googled it, but found nothing for my CD-ROM drive. Can some1 help me? It's a Philips CD-ROM/RW drive, series 400. If you need more info, tell me.
Thx for any help!
0 events found
Genyosha
30 Posts
0
November 30th, 2003 17:00
You may need to use the 'old-fashioned' way of setting up Windows, since I don't think your Dell Laptop has a BIOS option that allows you to load from USB, since neither my Inspiron 8100 nor Latitude C510 have it. I'm assuming you have access to a floppy drive, at least?
1) Boot the computer with a DOS / Windows 98 boot disk.
2) Run the "Fdisk" command and delete and recreate your partitions as FAT32, and then format.
3) Install DOS (I'm sure this is available somewhere on the web)
4) Install the DOS drivers for your USB drive, if you have them or can get them, otherwise you can't do this.
5) Reboot as necessary. Loading into DOS should load the USB drivers for your CD-ROM. You can then access the CDROM and install Windows2000 from the x:\I386\winnt.exe command.
6) During setup, there is an option that lets you choose your format type. There should be an option that lets you "Leave intact (no changes)" or something like that. Select that. You can always upgrade to NTFS after the install.
I can't tell you for sure if this will work, but I went through a similar procedure a looonggg time ago with one of my older laptops and a PCMCIA CDROM drive. But that was with Windows 95/98, which actually used the Autoexec.bat and Config.sys files loaded with the PCMCIA driver. I don't remember if Windows 2000 will process those two files at after the first reboot.
---
Of course, it would definitely be a whole heckuvalot easier to get on your friend's case and get your CDROM drive back.
java_dude
4 Posts
0
November 30th, 2003 19:00
So, what you`re saying is that there is no way to make the windows 2000 setup recognize my external drive? Oh jeez. This is bad, isn`t it? Arg, I would do the whole `old-fashioned` DOS thing (cuz I've done it before, but I also had a CD-ROM drive), but I really don`t want 2 mess anything up more than it already is.
Does any1 have another solution to make setup recognize my external CD-ROM drive so that I can install windows 2000?
java_dude
4 Posts
0
November 30th, 2003 21:00
Well... ok I`ll tell you exactly what happens. First, I copied the setup files to the hard drive. This means a much faster loading time (and no need for those floppies!). I can get into setup, and at the very start it asks if you want to install any drivers for SCSI devices. If I put in the driver disk for my CD-ROM, it says that it can`t find the file called `txtsetup.oem` and I guess it needs it. After that, it says:
----------------------------------------------Setup cannot find a CD-Rom Drive.
Make sure your CD-ROM drive is on and properly connected to your computer. If it is a SCSI CD-ROM drive, make sure your SCSI devices are properly terminated. See your computer or SCSI adapter documentation for more information.
----------------------------------------------
I need a way for setup to detect my external CD-ROM drive so that I can continue with setup. Thanks again for any help!
Genyosha
30 Posts
0
November 30th, 2003 21:00
It's not Windows Setup that's having a fit. It's your BIOS that's going through PMS. You gotta be able to "boot to USB device" before you can even start the Windows setup, right?