Loading XP from DOS with a PCMCIA CD ROM

  • Thread starter Thread starter Bill
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Bill

I am trying to load XP from the DOS prompt. After getting to the
prompt(D:\>I386) to launch XP, it begins to copy files and then the
display changes and says
"Please wait while Setup copies files to your hard disk."
Nothing happens after this. Any help would be helpful.
thanks,
Bill
 
Never mind....Thanks anyway. The unit set there for approximately 30
minutes and then it just started to work.
 
I am trying to load XP from the DOS prompt. After getting to the
prompt(D:\>I386) to launch XP, it begins to copy files and then the
display changes and says
"Please wait while Setup copies files to your hard disk."
Nothing happens after this. Any help would be helpful.
thanks,
Bill
Click to expand...

XP does not require DOS to install. The XP CD is to be booted normally or
download the 6 install floppy diskettes from Microsoft's web site
 
I am trying to load XP from the DOS prompt. After getting to the
prompt(D:\>I386) to launch XP, it begins to copy files and then the
display changes and says
"Please wait while Setup copies files to your hard disk."
Nothing happens after this. Any help would be helpful.
thanks,
Bill
Click to expand...


To install Windows XP, you don't need to get to a DOS
prompt. When you boot, hit whatever key(s) it takes to get
to your BIOS. Usually, it will be the Del key.

In your BIOS, be sure the computer is set up to boot to the
CD Rom drive FIRST. OR, you can set it to boot to the Floppy
drive, if you have one. Just be sure if you choose the
floppy drive option, that your floppy drive is EMPTY.

Your XP CD is a boot disk.

Pop in your XP CD, boot, and follow the prompts.

You should get your POST screen, and then you will get a
prompt, "If you wish to boot from the CD, press any key."

That's your cue to press a key and boot from the XP CD,
thereby beginning your XP install.

You will be asked to remove the partition (the old FDisk in
DOS), or to install XP.

I ALWAYS recommend, for a "fresh install," that you remove
the partition, then partition, then install.

the removing the partition only takes a matter of 2-3
MINUTES, and it insures a squeaky clean install.

Once the computer indicates that it is formatting, you can
leave the computer alone. If you happen to see it rebooting,
and you see the "If you wish to boot from the CD, press any
key...'

DO NOTHING!!! If you press a key THIS time, you are going
into a LOOP.

The next time you will have to type anything is when you are
being asked your name, etc, and to type in the key.



Hope that helps.


Good luck!


Tallahassee
 
I didn't get into the heres and theres of the whole story. I have a
PCMCIA Addonics CD player and am not able to use it to boot off of.
So, I made a dos boot disk and copied it to the hard drive and
configured it to boot and load the drivers for the PCMCIA player. At
that point the Addonics player worked as advertises, however it took
awhile for the files to start copying. It is now about 51% into
actually installing XP after the initial Dos install.
Thanks for your response.
 
Talahasee, re-read the OPs post. They have a Addronics PCCard CD-ROM, not
an internal unit. Bios won't help in this case since the PCMCIA (PCCard)
drivers would have to be loaded from DOS first. This is what the OP
described in their original.

TO THE OP (Bill). In the future if you have to reload the operating system,
you can shorten the time to load the files and install the OS by simply
first making sure that SmartDrv.exe (DOS Drive Cache program) is installed
along with the DOS PCMCIA drivers on your boot disk. Then copying all the
files on the CD onto a folder on the hard drive and running Setup from there
works well. Instead of 30-40 minutes without Smartdrive to copy the files
it will be roughly 10 minutes to copy the CD to the hard drive. Setup will
also run quicker than referencing the CD during the install.

I created a DOS boot disk a long time ago on a Win 98 SE machine. It
contains the files necessary to use the machine's internal CD drive (you
would have to include the PCMCIA drivers), Smartdrv.exe, Fdisk.exe,
Format.exe and Xcopy.exe on the disk. This way I can Partition, Format, set
up the disk cache for faster copy, and use Xcopy D:\*.* c:\WINDISK /e to
copy the entire D drive to the C drive in a folder called Windisk. If I use
this on an XP machine that won't boot to a CD, I convert to an HTFS drive
immediately after installing Windows.
 
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