doing a repair install on on winxp without a cd drive?[boot.ini torun setup.exe]

[giddy]

hi,

I have a laptop, its cd drive is busted.Fortunately, i can take the
harddrive out. I used an IDE to USB cable and made an image of my
desktop pc(i want to transfer it to the laptop). I sucessfully
restored the image onto the laptop HDD. Also, i copied (first made an
image(.bin) then extracted) my winXP CD onto the 2nd partition of my
laptop HDD

When i fit the HDD back into the laptop, it, reasonably complains
theres a hardware problem.I get the regular "windows had problems
because of a recent hardware change. Do you want to : Safe Mode* ,
Last Know Good Cfg , Start WIndows Normally"
Windows doe'snt start at all, and safe mode hangs, which is all fine.
What i want to do is run setup.exe which is on the 2nd partition?? I
need to do a repair, but the cddrive is busted.

Can i configure boot like this?

[boot loader]
timeout = 30
default = multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\SETUP.EXE***

[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS = "Microsoft Windows XP
Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn
??

How can i have setup.exe run as soon as the pc starts???

Thanks so much

Gideon

 

[Bruce Chambers]

hi,

I have a laptop, its cd drive is busted.Fortunately, i can take the
harddrive out. I used an IDE to USB cable and made an image of my
desktop pc(i want to transfer it to the laptop). I sucessfully
restored the image onto the laptop HDD. Also, i copied (first made an
image(.bin) then extracted) my winXP CD onto the 2nd partition of my
laptop HDD

When i fit the HDD back into the laptop, it, reasonably complains
theres a hardware problem.I get the regular "windows had problems
because of a recent hardware change. Do you want to : Safe Mode* ,
Last Know Good Cfg , Start WIndows Normally"
Windows doe'snt start at all, and safe mode hangs, which is all fine.
What i want to do is run setup.exe which is on the 2nd partition?? I
need to do a repair, but the cddrive is busted.

You'll need to fix/replace the CD drive.

Can i configure boot like this?

[boot loader]
timeout = 30
default = multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\SETUP.EXE***

You could, but it'll fail.

[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS = "Microsoft Windows XP
Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn
??

How can i have setup.exe run as soon as the pc starts???

You can't. There would have to be an OS loaded first.

Thanks so much

Gideon

--

Bruce Chambers

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[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

hi,

I have a laptop, its cd drive is busted.Fortunately, i can take the
harddrive out. I used an IDE to USB cable and made an image of my
desktop pc(i want to transfer it to the laptop). I sucessfully
restored the image onto the laptop HDD. Also, i copied (first made an
image(.bin) then extracted) my winXP CD onto the 2nd partition of my
laptop HDD

When i fit the HDD back into the laptop, it, reasonably complains
theres a hardware problem.I get the regular "windows had problems
because of a recent hardware change. Do you want to : Safe Mode* ,
Last Know Good Cfg , Start WIndows Normally"
Windows doe'snt start at all, and safe mode hangs, which is all fine.
What i want to do is run setup.exe which is on the 2nd partition?? I
need to do a repair, but the cddrive is busted.

Can i configure boot like this?

[boot loader]
timeout = 30
default = multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\SETUP.EXE***

[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS = "Microsoft Windows XP
Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn
??

How can i have setup.exe run as soon as the pc starts???

Thanks so much

Gideon

There is a way to do this but not along the lines you suggested.
Try this for starters:
1. Connect the laptop disk to your desktop PC, using a 2.5" to
3.5" adapter (which is NOT the same as an IDE to USB adapter!)
2. Create a primary active 20 GByte FAT partition on it.
3. Boot the desktop PC with a Win98 boot disk from www.bootdisk.com.
4. Use this command to make the laptop disk bootable:
sys F: (where F: is the laptop drive)
5. Check if the laptop can be booted into DOS.

Report your progress here to get the remaining instructions.

 

[giddy]

hi, thanks for the reply.

I finally managed to get *one* of the partitions on the laptop drive
bootable.
(I have C, D, E on the laptop) i did :
sys E:

But when i put the disk back in the laptop, it loads windows and
windows still complains.:
"Wndows did not start sucessfully, a recent hardware or software
change might have caused this"

Windows is installed on C: and programs on D:

How do i get to boot from the E:\ , sys partition??

Also, i copied the winxp cd on an iso, then extracted it on E:,

Thanks so much
Gideon

 

[Don R]

hi, thanks for the reply.

I finally managed to get *one* of the partitions on the laptop drive
bootable.
(I have C, D, E on the laptop) i did :
sys E:

But when i put the disk back in the laptop, it loads windows and
windows still complains.:
"Wndows did not start sucessfully, a recent hardware or software
change might have caused this"

Windows is installed on C: and programs on D:

How do i get to boot from the E:\ , sys partition??

Also, i copied the winxp cd on an iso, then extracted it on E:,

Thanks so much
Gideon

I think you need to set the boot drive in BIOS.