I have a laptop that the keyboard does not work until windows loads. So I can
not boot from the installation disc, because I cant press any key by the
"press any key to boot from CD" option.

Is there a way for me to copy the installation files onto the hard drive (by
hooking it upto a different machine) and to make it that the installation
files are bootable off of the hard drive?

Thanks

charles wrote:
> I have a laptop that the keyboard does not work until windows
> loads. So I can not boot from the installation disc, because I cant
> press any key by the "press any key to boot from CD" option.
>
> Is there a way for me to copy the installation files onto the hard
> drive (by hooking it upto a different machine) and to make it that
> the installation files are bootable off of the hard drive?

Use a USB keyboard and turn on USB legacy support in the BIOS.

--
Shenan Stanley
MS-MVP
--
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

I cant access the bios as the keyboard does not work.

"Shenan Stanley" wrote:

> charles wrote:
> > I have a laptop that the keyboard does not work until windows
> > loads. So I can not boot from the installation disc, because I cant
> > press any key by the "press any key to boot from CD" option.
> >
> > Is there a way for me to copy the installation files onto the hard
> > drive (by hooking it upto a different machine) and to make it that
> > the installation files are bootable off of the hard drive?
>
> Use a USB keyboard and turn on USB legacy support in the BIOS.
>
> --
> Shenan Stanley
> MS-MVP
> --
> How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
> http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
>
>
>

charles wrote:
> I have a laptop that the keyboard does not work until windows
> loads. So I can not boot from the installation disc, because I cant
> press any key by the "press any key to boot from CD" option.
>
> Is there a way for me to copy the installation files onto the hard
> drive (by hooking it upto a different machine) and to make it that
> the installation files are bootable off of the hard drive?

Shenan Stanley wrote:
> Use a USB keyboard and turn on USB legacy support in the BIOS.

charles wrote:
> I cant access the bios as the keyboard does not work.

So you have tried to hook up either a USB (or if the computer is so
equipped) PS/2 keyboard to the laptop and it does not recognize those inputs
either?

So this laptop is defective? Or secured by someone else so that you could
not do this?

Yes - you can remove the drive, connect it to another machine, format and
make it bootable (Windows 98SE DOS), copy the Windows XP CD to it, boot to
DOS and start the Windows XP install from the hard disk drive using the
WINNT.EXE command line.

--
Shenan Stanley
MS-MVP
--
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

charles wrote:
> I have a laptop that the keyboard does not work until windows
> loads. So I can not boot from the installation disc, because I cant
> press any key by the "press any key to boot from CD" option.
>
> Is there a way for me to copy the installation files onto the hard
> drive (by hooking it upto a different machine) and to make it that
> the installation files are bootable off of the hard drive?

Shenan Stanley wrote:
> Use a USB keyboard and turn on USB legacy support in the BIOS.

charles wrote:
> I cant access the bios as the keyboard does not work.

Shenan Stanley wrote:
> So you have tried to hook up either a USB (or if the computer is so
> equipped) PS/2 keyboard to the laptop and it does not recognize
> those inputs either?
>
> So this laptop is defective? Or secured by someone else so that
> you could not do this?
>
> Yes - you can remove the drive, connect it to another machine,
> format and make it bootable (Windows 98SE DOS), copy the Windows XP
> CD to it, boot to DOS and start the Windows XP install from the
> hard disk drive using the WINNT.EXE command line.

You also want to ensure you have SMARTDRV loaded.

--
Shenan Stanley
MS-MVP
--
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

"Shenan Stanley" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

[...]

> Yes - you can remove the drive, connect it to another machine, format and
> make it bootable (Windows 98SE DOS), copy the Windows XP CD to it, boot to
> DOS and start the Windows XP install from the hard disk drive using the
> WINNT.EXE command line.

Why should someone use this clumsy way to setup Windows XP on an extra hd?
WINNT32.EXE /MakeLocalSource rulez!

Stefan