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Reformating a Lap Top with no CD ROM

Regs

Regs

Lifer
So I have a lap top here, pretty old, an IBM think pad from 3-4 years ago. The buyer at the time did not choose to get it with a CD-ROM because it is considered proprietary hardware.

So how on earth do you reformat and run a fresh install of windows on a lap top with no CD-ROM?
 
Take the drive out. Get a laptop to IDE converter cable (usually like 3-5 bux) and put it in a desktop and format the drive as bootable. Then copy the Windows CD onto the drive and install from there.

Or you could get a CD-ROM for this laptop.
 
If you have a floppy drive, use Tom's Root Boot disk. It's a small linux distro that fits on floppy and u can use a command to format it so you don't need a cd-rom. If you need the command PM me. I think I got it here amongst my papers.
 
hm. Never tried any of those ideas....Never used linux so I might be a little afraid to use it. mikecel79 listed likely the more easier way of doing so.
 
Can you get to a network with systems that have CD-ROMs? If so try this (I hope it has a floppy...) then load your OS from the network share by running the setup (or winnt.exe). Otherwise, you can try this off of a USB drive if it will boot from it (some Thinkpads will).
 
network installation is the only viable root IMO. Even if if you format the disk with fdisk you wil not be able to access the WINDOWS CD to install the software. As it is 3-4 yrs old I guess the laptop is not equiped to boot from an external CD drive.
 
another idea might be to resize your laptops primary partition
then create an extended partition
boot back into windows and copy the cab files onto the extended partition
the redo the primary partition and reinstall

that way your ready for next time and also you might have room for a ghost back up on the extended partition as well
 
Originally posted by: thegorx
another idea might be to resize your laptops primary partition
then create an extended partition
boot back into windows and copy the cab files onto the extended partition
the redo the primary partition and reinstall

that way your ready for next time and also you might have room for a ghost back up on the extended partition as well
Click to expand...


I was think about this also. Just making a partition big enough to fit XP on it. Then reformat the other partiton.

So I can reformat the entire drive as a whole and create a network boot disc. The use a crossover cable to format windows on it?

Or I can do what thegorx mentioned.
 
You're making this sound hard.....I suspect you want W98 on the laptop?

Install the drive in another regular computer using an adapter. Format it into two partitions, making the first bootable. Copy the W98 cab files into the second partition. Reinstall the drive into the laptop. Boot to DOS. Change to the drive where the W98 cab files are located. Type setup. Hit enter....that's it.
 
FreeBSD allows you to install over the parallel port used as a network device. Comes in handy for my Toshiba with no CD and no USB either.

Of course taking out the harddrive and install it with an adapter will work, too, but it's not sportive.
 
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