Krimit

Hey all. Looking for some technical advice here.

I'm non-too computer savvy, but i figured "Heck! Formatting and re-installing windows can't be too big a task for me!". Well, it is. It's probably something totally obvious to some of you, but i'm just about to give up.

After the crash i formatted the HD from DOS. At first, after the format, i couldn't get to dos, so couldn't install the drivers for my dvdrom, and therefore couldn't install windows (XP).
What i did was download a boot disk and use that to start up the computer. using this boot, i manage to get to dos and monkey around a bit..... But when i tried to install the drivers, it said it needed a certein file in order to work! Now, i know this file is on the boot disk, but how do i get it onto my HD? Am i even on the right path to getting XP installed? I'm feeling totally lost here, and any advice, tips, help, house calls, and encouragement would be greately appreciated.

Krimit

Byteman

The XP cd is bootable. No need for dos. Put the cd in the cdrom and reboot the machine. (you MAY have to change the boot order in the bios)

__________________
Don't byte off more than you can chew...

Krimit

Hey, thanks for the reply.
That won't work. The reason i was thinking of doing the whole dos thing was because the dvd won't work. I mean, it lights up and opens on command, and it even apears in the bios, but it won't boot. I've tried setting the dvd to boot first with the xp cd inside, but to no avail. any other ideas?

atomic

Go into D:\i386 folder D: being your cd-rom drive (you may find its shifted a letter or two because of the bootdisk, this is temporary) type winnt.exe to launch the setup. If you need smart drive go here
and download it unzip it to a floppy and run it after you have booted up of your bootdisk.

Hope this helps

EDIT: Also when your booting of the bootdisk make sure you select boot with cd-rom drive support.

Krimit

Eek! Alright, I think i may have found the problem. (Atomic, the whole problem is that i'm UNABLE to read anything from the rom drive. I should also note (if it was somehow unclear) that the computer in question is NOT the one i'm using now, but an older, less sophisticated machine.)

I downloaded 6 bootdisks from the microsoft site and ran those. all worked well..... well, that is, until the boot disks finished installing and i was prompted to insert the win xp cd to install windows. Only now did i discover that the little yellow light isn't blinking when i insert the disk, leading me to believe...... that i'm dealing with a simple loose IDE or something. I'll try jiggling a bit with it and report back. Thanks all for the support!
(I'de still like to hear and thoughts anyone might have about how stupid i am, how to avoid mistakes like this in the future, and what is the best method of tearing apart a pc with a sledghammer. Thanks.)

Krimit