Help me install Windows XP on a laptop with no CD-ROM!!!

[iamme]

I just got a Thinkpad X20 that has no CD-ROM. It's got Windows 98 on it right now. I want to do a reformat and fresh install of Windows XP. I've done plenty of WinXP installs on desktops and laptops with CD-ROM's. Now I'm stumped.

Aside from buying a USB CD-ROM and trying to boot from that, do I have any other options?

The "Boot Options" setup has a "Network Boot" option. Can I use this somehow? I have a 4 port WiFi router. Connected to that is a desktop that has a CD-ROM...can I utilize that somehow?

 

[Budman]

Connect to your network,then share your cd drive on the network. then copy the i386 folder to your laptop hd.

After it's done boot on dos [ F8 ] then

deltree c:\progra~1
deltree c:\windows

Now go into your i386 folder & type " winnt " this will start the XP installation.

 

[iamme]

Will this allow me to reformat to NTFS?

 

[Lord Evermore]

He'd be stuck with the FAT32 file system on the laptop drive then, plus the other files left behind, unless he goes and deletes everything after the install and hopes he doesn't delete something important. Of course it'd work and it'd be easy.

The network boot option requires you have a "boot server" that the laptop would then load the operating system from, but you still would have to copy the files to the hard drive (I can't imagine the time it would take to INSTALL WinXP using files not stored locally). And you'd have to use FAT32 since you couldn't make it an NTFS partition. You could also get a DOS boot disk with network drivers to allow you to map a network drive, so you could format the laptop drive, then copy the files over to it (so it's clean rather than having leftover files), but again it'd be FAT32. Booting from the network drive however should allow you to format the drive with NTFS, but the slow slow slow transfer rates essentially make a network install impossible.

You could buy a 2.5 inch drive enclosure, connect it to an existing computer, and clone the partition to the laptop drive. Though you'd then have to deal with hardware detection and all that. You could also do an install on another machine with a blank drive, but before it reboots the final time, stop the install and copy that drive to the 2.5 inch drive, then the laptop would be at the last stages of the install (I can't recall if it needs the CDROM again after that).

It's unlikely you'll be able to boot from a USB drive with the laptop, but I couldn't say for sure. If there's no option in the BIOS, it ain't happening.

 

[ozone13]

Originally posted by: iamme
Will this allow me to reformat to NTFS?

it would install on fat32....BUT you could always convert your filesystem to ntfs within winxp...very simple to do and no data loss.

 

[iamme]

It looks like I can boot from an IBM USB CD-ROM: Text

(New) Support for ThinkPad X20 systems.
(New) Support for boot feature from IBM USB Portable CD-ROM Drive (part number (P/N) 33L5151).

Think this will allow for third party USB CD-ROMs?

 

[Lord Evermore]

It might work with third party drives, but who knows. IBM most likely used a standard chip for the enclosure, so the driver should be "generic" for that as well as the CD drive itself. However it looks like they're specifying a Teac CD drive for MSCDEX; I don't know if that will matter or not. It's been way too long since any of this DOS driver stuff came my way.

 

[ozone13]

Originally posted by: iamme
It looks like I can boot from an IBM USB CD-ROM: Text

(New) Support for ThinkPad X20 systems.
(New) Support for boot feature from IBM USB Portable CD-ROM Drive (part number (P/N) 33L5151).

Think this will allow for third party USB CD-ROMs?

Might be able to.....check forums online (more ibm based). You might just have to flash the firmware to be able to boot using other usb cdrom drives. You can also try using pcmcia cdrom drives.....older notebooks will only boot off of these types.

 

[iamme]

Originally posted by: ozone13

Might be able to.....check forums online (more ibm based). You might just have to flash the firmware to be able to boot using other usb cdrom drives. You can also try using pcmcia cdrom drives.....older notebooks will only boot off of these types.

Hmm....I was just thinking about a PCMCIA CD-ROM....

 

[0roo0roo]

Think this will allow for third party USB CD-ROMs?

yes i want to know too z505js here, damn sony overcharges for their cdroms so i didn't get one

i'd want an external dvd anyways, even if it use pcmia(sp)

the way i did it was i copied the entire winxp cd to my 2nd partition on the hd through network connection. i dunno about copying through network from dos though, wouldnt dos spend its time truncating long file names?


best way to do laptop is to dual boot for safety. taht way you always have another os to access network from if one os dies. but then you need atleast one more partition sacrifice an 800mb partition for a win98se backup os. i ghosted my plain os install and left that on the 2nd partition, that way no matter what i can boot from floppy and restore a fresh copy of windows, assuming the harddrive still works

wish i knew if any cheapo usb cd was bootable. that or a simple way of accessing network through dos.

 

[ozone13]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo




best way to do laptop is to dual boot for safety. taht way you always have another os to access network from if one os dies. but then you need atleast one more partition sacrifice an 800mb partition for a win98se backup os. i ghosted my plain os install and left that on the 2nd partition, that way no matter what i can boot from floppy and restore a fresh copy of windows, assuming the harddrive still works

Then you have to have a fat32 partition.....very unsecure. Just back up your harddrive regularly, have copies of the boot files and you'll be okay. Win98 is a waste of space.

 

[0roo0roo]

its not that unsecure. fat 32's served me fine, then again i dont keep high security secrets on my pc's. most people don't.

why is win98 not a waste of space? ever try backing up lots of files in tons of directories or files with long file names from dos prompt? not fun.. not fun at all. getting nnetwork through dos even worse.

 

[CZroe]

You can take laptop drives out and connect them to a desktop with the right equipment. It worked for my friend's laptop w/ no floppy or CD-ROM. We just formatted and copied WinXPs files to a bootable NTFS partition and then reinserted it in the laptop for the actual install.

 

[Lord Evermore]

Wow. I didn't even know you could make a "bootable NTFS partition", I've never needed to try before. This page describes how to make a bootable floppy; can you just copy those same files to the hard drive? I would think the master boot record wouldn't be properly written to make use of the files (since it's not a floppy with the proper NT formatting).

Incidentally, converting from FAT32 to NTFS results in 512 byte clusters. Less than optimal.

 

[Bluefront]

Since you have W98 working, copy the whole XP cdrom to a second partition. You could use a parallel port connection, a LAN connection, whatever. Then you can simply upgrade W98 to XP.

There seems to be no down-side to this and it works perfectly. I've done this several times...no sweat.

 

[Shalmanese]

Since you got a X20, shouldn't that come pre-loaded with Win XP? In that case, you can simply just push some button at startup and it will do all the yucky formatting and re-installing by itself. Unlike most vendors, IBM have suprisingly little crud-ware with their re-load and its VERY easy to get off the machine.

 

[0roo0roo]

i got the impression he has only one partition

and upgrading to xp is a less attractive option if you install straight over 98, if he had a 2nd partition and installed xp on the 2nd one that would be fine since its a clean os install.

 

[iamme]

Originally posted by: Shalmanese
Since you got a X20, shouldn't that come pre-loaded with Win XP? In that case, you can simply just push some button at startup and it will do all the yucky formatting and re-installing by itself. Unlike most vendors, IBM have suprisingly little crud-ware with their re-load and its VERY easy to get off the machine.

My X20 comes with a Windows 98 COA. I just got this off of eBay. Ran into some minor glitches, so I think I'm going to try and get a PCMCIA CD-ROM first and try to boot from that.

Thanks for the help so far, guys

 

[Lord Evermore]

I think the creation of a second partition is actually a better idea, in that you don't have to pay for a CD drive just for this. Of course, having a CD drive is always a useful thing anyway. I think there are free apps that let you resize partitions (definitely one for doing so is included with most linux distributions). Just make a very small FAT32 partition, so you aren't losing a lot of space to it, just enough to hold the CD. During the XP install you can format the primary partition with NTFS. Then leave the CD files on that partition and convert it to NTFS with XP, and leave it there, so you don't need to worry about having the CD handy with the laptop again later, and XP will always know where to find the files.

 

[CZroe]

Partition magic, Ghost and others will let you resize NTFS partitions. You can delete the second partition and use Partition Magic's utility to change all references to the setup files to a new folder on your expanded NTFS partition or PC Mag's Change of Address utility if you did it with Ghost (Ghost requires you to be cloning from another partition or image file to resize to the destination drive anyway).

 

[JackBurton]

Here you go man, an answr to your problem:

Get a 44pin to 40 pin converter. Install your hard drive (laptop) in your desktop and then install XP. After the install is complete, run sysprep and shut the machine down. Install the laptop drive back in the laptop and then install the proper drivers.

 

[CZroe]

Uhh, you don't want to install it on a desktop! Switching motherboards an an XP installation makes an unreversable mess of things and causes serious performance issues. Instead, use the adapter to make a bootable FAT32 partition. Copy the i386 directory to a CABS of installation directory. Then put it back in the laptop and run setup from the drive. You can then convert to FAT32 and change the install folder in the registry if you want to delete the setup files (I wouldn't reccommend deleting them if you have no CD-ROM).

 

[JackBurton]

Uhh, you don't want to install it on a desktop! Switching motherboards an an XP installation makes an unreversable mess of things and causes serious performance issues.

Uhh, that is why you use sysprep. It reverts the system back to a state previous to the install. Basically a fresh install. Trust me, it will work just fine.

p.s. Sysprep can be found on the XP CD.

 

[buleyb]

Originally posted by: JackBurton

Uhh, you don't want to install it on a desktop! Switching motherboards an an XP installation makes an unreversable mess of things and causes serious performance issues.

Uhh, that is why you use sysprep. It reverts the system back to a state previous to the install. Basically a fresh install. Trust me, it will work just fine.

p.s. Sysprep can be found on the XP CD.

Yep, this works just fine...Agreed (and its never bad to have these 44to40pin converters around anyways)

 

[Sid59]

i'd ..

create a second parition
copy the XP CD from the network onto the 2nd parition
get a copy of ghost
dump a ghost copy to the 2nd parition, just in case you mess up.
boot disk and delete the c parition
run the setup for XP