How do I boot from W2K CD??

[WHATif]

I am new to PC's. I am running W2k on 1.33 GHZ Athlon machine. I haven't had to re-install the OS yet. I am scared that one day I will have to and I don't know how:-(
On a Mac you can just put the OS cd in and choose restart while holding down the C key. This will make the computer boot from the CD and then you can reinstall,initalize etc
What do I need to do to make the machine boot from my W2K CD???

I was also trying to create an emergency repair disk it said that it was created sucessfully but when I restarted the computer with the repair disk floppy in the drive...the computer told me that NTLDR is missing. Please help with advice or any usefull links.

Back up wizard...what does it do ??? What do I backup everything to??? I mean what media??

Please help.


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AnandTech Moderator

 

[huanaku]

I haven't used the back-up wizard before, so I'm not sure about that. As for booting to CD, you need to go to your BIOS at bootup, and select boot to CD as your first option. When your computer boots, it will say "Press any key to boot to CD". Press a key, and it will boot. You need the Win2k CD in for it to boot like that. Most CD's just boot without asking to press a key.

 

[smp]

heh heh.. your Mac naivete is cute.

Okay.. just givewhat huanaku said a try, you don't have to run the setup, just boot off of it, and when it's done booting (a couple of minutes) it'll give you some options, one of them being 'Quit'.. so you push F3 and get out of there. This would just serve familiarize you in the case that you ever do have to reinstall, because that seems to be your worry. Might as well get a little practise in right. Another thing, familiarize yourself with the bios too, when you boot up the machine, hit delete (or maybe F1, whichever your board tells you on powerup) and then you should be in the bios. Look around, since you're on these forums now, I imagine that you cruise and you'll see some things and then maybe know what they are etc.. PC's are good, Macs are good. Just a question though, why did you make the switch?

One more note;
I don't know if you have partitoined your hard drive, but this is something I like to do in the case that I have to reinstall. I create a partition for my operation system and apps and one for my media and work. This way, when i reinstall windows all my sh!t is still on my other partition just like I left it. I also have a folder on that partition that has all my drivers, directx and any other system files/apps that I need after a reinstall. Have fun with your PC.

 

[WHATif]

I moved because the standard software in my "Product design" field are PC based only.
My HD was partitioned when I bought the PC. When you reinstall does it not install over both the partitions?? Or does that happen when I reformat the HD??

 

[smp]

No

When you run the windows setup, it will ask you which drive you want to install to, and it also has a pretty decent partitioning feature built into it. It'll show you your current partition scheme (I'm guessing c: and d: ) and then you can just point it to c: and it'll ask you if you want to format (I always do) and that's it. It leaves whatever is on d: untouched, unless you want it to. The partitions are as good as two physical drives. The operating system doesn't really see a difference, they are written in the MBR of your hard drive and you need special partitioning software like fdisk or partition magic to mess around with them. The win2k setup also has a partition program built into it as well, like I've mentioned. You can reformat c: (aka > format c: ) without reformatting your whole hard drive, or you can delete the partitions with fdisk or partition magic and then format the whole drive as one if you want too. It's all in your hands if you know what you're doing.

 

[WHATif]

Ok I went to BIOS and ....... and I managed to boot from the CD and do a dry run. Where is this fdisk thing??? Is it in the W2k CD as well???
So basically I should put all my software and work files on the D drive and the W2K stuff on the C....??? right ???

 

[WHATif]

Is it really so important to partition ??
Can't I leave it as one??

 

[smp]

I thougt you said it's already partitioned. Hey don't go changing anything if everything is working. Leave it be.

Fdisk is actually just a little command line utility that is usually found on win98 startup disks. You can get a bootdisk that has it from bootdisk.com if you ever need one. Don't worry about fdisk, because you already have a partitioning program in the win2k setup. And yes, if you have a c: drive, I like (this is all personal preference, no doubt people will tell you various things) to put my installed programs in there along with the operating system. My d: and e: drives have all my media and work, they have been there through several installs. I also keep my drivers and anything I need after install in e:/system just to make it easier after the install. This is all my personal preference though remember. I'm just showing you as an example of what can be done, that's all. Which way you decide to do it in the end is up to you. I wouldn't worry about reinstalling right now if everything is working and stable.

 

[WHATif]

I am not touching anything apart from the mouse 🙂
I am only asking for future referrence. So you have partitioned your HD into 3 parts ?? Right

 

[smp]

Yup.. 30 gig hard drive partitioned into three

c: 5 gig
d: 5 gig
e: 15 gig


You might be wondering why my math is flawed.. it kind of sort of is, but not really. Windows doesn't recognize or show EXT2 partitions and I'm dual booting with Linux Debian on a 5 gig partition, so that is where the lost dimension is. 🙂