install XP from scratch

[targa1300ws]

Hard drive is full (3GB free) and many folders won t delete... I need to
resintall the lot but am confronted with WINDOWS, possibly the update
conspiracy?

old XP Home laptop (s. name, 2001) with Targa XP recovery CD, but
- CDRom out of order, else A drive, USB DVD/CD reader (USB 1!)
- tried different ways over BIOS, starting recovery CD...
--> same "windows set up" error message always: WINDOWS on my laptop is more
recent than one on CD.
Have deinstalled Pack3 without any result. Error message does not allow to
proceed with any function of the recovery CD.
\i386\winnt32.exe /cmdcons did not succeed either.
boot from Adrive did not work as if could not deal with DOS or at least
content.

Any suggestion welcome

 

[David B.]

You need to boot from the CD, not start setup from within Windows.