Can't boot from XP CD

[Guest]

Hello,
My hard drive on my dell inspiron 1100 laptop was shot, so i replaced it
with a new seagate 40 gb hard drive. When I was trying to boot XP (SP1) off
the cd, it got to installing the system files about 75% and then it said it
couldn't copy p3.sys. If I skip that file, then it will get stuck on another
file. Any Suggestions?

Thanks,
Rob

 

[Tim]

Hello,
My hard drive on my dell inspiron 1100 laptop was shot, so i replaced it
with a new seagate 40 gb hard drive. When I was trying to boot XP (SP1) off
the cd, it got to installing the system files about 75% and then it said it
couldn't copy p3.sys. If I skip that file, then it will get stuck on another
file. Any Suggestions?

Thanks,
Rob

Start with the easy stuff...is the CD dirty? Have you tried cleaning the
CD drive? Perhaps your new HD is defective...run a disk utility on it.
UBCD is pretty good: http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

Tim

 

[Guest]

Thanks for the response.

I'm new to running a system reinstall. Can I run a disk utility without an
OS? How do I do so? The cd is clean and I've had problems with the cd drive
in the past. Could this contribute?

Rob

 

[David B.]

That's an important piece of info, a flaky cd drive could definitely cause
file copy errors during setup, along with bad ram and a bad hard drive.

 

[Guest]

ok. sorry for not including that information. So if the cd drive is a
problem, is there a way to install the os without it?

Rob

 

[Tim]

Thanks for the response.

I'm new to running a system reinstall. Can I run a disk utility without an
OS? How do I do so? The cd is clean and I've had problems with the cd drive
in the past. Could this contribute?

Rob

Hmmm...having problems with the CD drive in the past would have been a
good thing to mention up front ;-) Yes, that is likely the cause of the
problem...depending on your definition of "problem."

Yes, you can run a disk utility "without an OS." In the example of UBCD,
the PC boots from the CD...it contains its own OS. Some of them boot a
Linux kernel (I *think* this is what UBCD has). It doesn't matter as
long as it can access the file system of the hard drive. But in your
case, with the new information you provided I wouldn't bother trying to
run a disk utility until you try a new CD drive.

Tim