Reformatting without floppy or cd drive

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mj_computer

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Reformatting without floppy or cd drive (solved)

Hello, I've got a desktop machine running xp that i'd like to reformat. I'm used to formatting using a floppy drive but this machine does not have one. Also in bios i cannot seem to select my CD drive to boot from, so my only selected boot drive is the hdd.

I have a win 2000, and windows XP cd. Iv'e tried putting both in and neither run before windows boots up. Is there something else i can change to get the computer to recognize a bootable cd before xp loads up?

I've seen usb drives that can install windows xp, but with vista out and Microsoft discontinuing stock i doubt i'd still be able to purchase one.

Any help or suggestions on this issue would be greatly appreciated!
 
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Hi why you want to re-install xp m8?
it running slow? or you get pop-ups all the tme?
and a bit more info on your desktop specs would also help
 
Deviousmind said:
Hi why you want to re-install xp m8?
it running slow? or you get pop-ups all the tme?
and a bit more info on your desktop specs would also help
Click to expand...

The PC's running well except i'm having troubles with dvd's. Im not sure if its a codec problem but after i installed divx the computer crashes everytime i try to run any dvds. I've tried power DVD and windows media player and both either crash or just dont show any image (sound work in media player if it hasnt already crashed).

Comps a quad core p4 intel, 2 gig ram, LG dvd burner. windows xp sp3. Not sure what other info might help.
 
It's possible to make a bootable XP with a flashdrive using nlite and several other utilities to put the image on the flash drive
 
shoehorned said:
It's possible to make a bootable XP with a flashdrive using nlite and several other utilities to put the image on the flash drive
Click to expand...

Oh wo that sounds alright, iv'e found the nlite website but i'm not sure what to do next to go about making the flashdrive bootable. Could anyone put forward a simple walkthrough or software list i might need?
 
No problem. If you do try that out, please post on here if you did it successful or not, because I also tried that and got stuck on one of the steps. I ended up just burning a copy of nlited XP onto a CD and installed it from there instead of using a flash drive.
 
shoehorned said:
No problem. If you do try that out, please post on here if you did it successful or not, because I also tried that and got stuck on one of the steps. I ended up just burning a copy of nlited XP onto a CD and installed it from there instead of using a flash drive.
Click to expand...

I was following along with this method but didn't see it through, when i went into the bios settings i found that booting from cd drives was actually disabled and that was why the dvd drive didn't show up in the boot list.

My next problem is with power dvd, i reinstalled it again and yet again the same problem (black screen but full audio, the image only shows up when i move the application window around). What iv'e done now is just remove power dvd, and use k-lite codec pack to run dvd's via windows media player. It must be the version of power dvd i have (it came with this new computer on the intel chipset cd), other versions iv'e used before have never done this.

I think i'll leave it at that, more mucking around with other versions of power dvd might just confuse the computer with the codecs from k-lite. Thanks for the help!
 
try the vlc player. it supports DVD eith a lot of tools.
it will end up as ur ultimate media player supporting almost every audio and video format present.
 
no k lite should create no problem..
i use both of them alongside.
but remember the older version of vlc (vlc 8.x) is much better than newer (vlc9.x). newer version doesn't support much codecs. i dont know why, coz newer version are expected to be better than older.
 
sshaggy said:
try the vlc player. it supports DVD eith a lot of tools.
it will end up as ur ultimate media player supporting almost every audio and video format present.
Click to expand...

not sure if it was the vlc player but I think it was giving me terrible video quality from dvd's
 
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