# Laptop Woes



## MarkF (Jul 5, 2003)

I reformatted my laptop on Friday but it will not recognise my XP disk. I am laptopless









I have made sure the DOS menu is correct, picking up CD drive first, but when I choose end and it tells me it will re-boot up, it tries and then says "non system disk, please replace and try again"

Anybody?


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## gravedodger (Feb 15, 2004)

sounds like your primary partition is possibly corrupt, you might need to delete primary partition and start from scratch again.

or try reformatting the drive, a full format, not the "format /q" quick version !

you could also do it from a win98 start-up floppy disk, use "fdisk" to wipe out partition and then format the drive in dos and also use the dos command to see if your laptop is atleast reading the CD rom ... "e:/dir" or whatever your drive letter should be for your CDrom

hope some o this helps


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## rhaythorne (Jan 12, 2004)

Do what gravedodger said, or, if you have another computer with Internet access and six blank floppy disks you can download the Windows XP boot disks from Microsoft:

See Microsoft Knowledge Base Article 310994 for details.


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## MarkF (Jul 5, 2003)

I might have to go the floppy route









I am having to travel to my Mum's to access work emails, pathetic.









I have totally refreshed and reformatted the laptop but I still can't get XP to boot from the CD "Invalid system disk - Please replace and try again" although I can read the CD via dir in DOS? I think I will have to lie down for a bit


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## Stan (Aug 7, 2003)

Mark,

Is "boot from CD rom" enabled in the bios? If not the laptop will only "see" the hard drive which has no files on it, hence the invalid system disk message.


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## rhaythorne (Jan 12, 2004)

Stan can obviously type faster than me; I Was just about to say that.

The only other thing I can think of is that your XP CD may be an "upgrade" disc designed to upgrade a PC which already has an existing operating system (which yours no longer has)







I'm not sure, but I suspect those particular discs may not be bootable.

Good luck with the floppies if that's what you have to do. I once installed Windows 95 and MS-Office onto a laptop entirely from floppy disk. About 55 or so disks as I recall!! So six to boot into XP isn't all that bad


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## tom (Jun 2, 2003)

As noted above the most likely case is the CD drive not set to boot in the BIOS.

So you could start up with a windows floppy and install windows98 or Me and then upgrade to Xp.

However do make sure that you deleated all partions, reforrmatted and reset the primary partition the first time around!!!!

If not then you will have to do it all again.

Tom


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## tom (Jun 2, 2003)

JUST A THOUGHT/ AT THE COMMAND PROMPT WHAT DO YOU SEE

AS THE DRIVE LETTER, IF A THEN IT SHOULD BE CHANGED TO E AND THEN TYPE

SETUP: AND THEN PRESS RETURN.

i TRUST YOU DO NOT THINK I AM TELLING GRANNY HOW TO SUCK EGGS BUT OFTEN IT IS THE SIMPLE THINGS THAT CAUSE THE MOST PROBLEMS.


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## MarkF (Jul 5, 2003)

tom said:


> JUST A THOUGHT/ AT THE COMMAND PROMPT WHAT DO YOU SEE
> 
> AS THE DRIVE LETTER, IF A THEN IT SHOULD BE CHANGED TO E AND THEN TYPE
> 
> ...


Still f****d, still at my Mum's









Thank for all the replies, I appreciate them all. However I am not completely daft and yes, the bios is set to read the CD drive first









I have just borrowed another XP disk so hopefully I wil be back in the online world later today. The comment aboue the upgrade diak was interesting because that is what I orignally borrowed it for, to lay over ME.

Tom, I have a problem there, after the "a" prompt I enter "E" then "setup" at the prompt. I get this "CDR101 Not ready Reading E" Abort Retry etc etc.

Any bright ideas?


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## tom (Jun 2, 2003)

perhaps not a bright idea.

But in the past I have found that if you just reinput the command line after 2or 3 goes it works.


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## MarkF (Jul 5, 2003)

My laptop's CD drive is nacked







Â£185 to fit a new one, no chance









I am not bothered as I have a spare







.................. in Poland









First Toshiba I have broken, they are usually rock solid.

Finding a cheap desk top this weekend is my first job I miss the forum, can't even lurk.


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## Mrcrowley (Apr 23, 2003)

Should be able to get one cheaper than that









Just noticed my post count.

Maximum anyone should have - 1 710


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## pg tips (May 16, 2003)

MarkF said:


> I miss the forum, can't even lurk.


 We're missing you mark, get it sorted my man. Btw did you see Roy say Volvo's are old men's cars?


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