reinstall from upgrade disk

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Guest

My computer was supplied with windows Me and I upgraded it to XP (home).
Having moved to FAT32 and in need of space I deleted the old Me files.
The hard disk has since had a catastrophic breakdown.
It won't let me install windows xp from the upgrade disk because it can't
find a previous version of windows on the drive (either because I deleted Me,
or because of the hard disk problem - I don't know which).
I have got a new hard disk now, but again it won't let me install xp from
the upgrade disk because it can't find an existing version of windows.
I don't want to buy another version of xp as it isn't that long ago that I
paid for the upgrade.
Ideas?
 
Hi,

To do a clean install of WinXP with an upgrade disk requires that you have
an existing (even if not functional) installation of a qualifying product,
or the media for one (normally CD). If it cannot read the drive, or if you
have long deleted the WinME installation, you will need to show it the CD
media used to install WinME. If you do not possess such, then you will have
to locate (and possibly purchase) one. The upgrade will not proceed without
it, and unlike some earlier upgrade iterations, there are no easy
workarounds.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
 
I ran into this same issue with upgrade of MS Office. It's easy if you have
ME CD and 2 cdrom drives. When asked for previuos license, just install ME CD
in other CDROM drive. Probably could do w/single drive and just swap CD(s)
when req'd. Not positive though about swap alternative
 
If you don't have the original media for ME then you will need to buy
from ebay for a sausage or ask a friend to make a copy for you so that
you can insert it in the drive when asked to do so (or browse) during
installation. Win98 media will do the trick as well.

hth
 
Thanks to all.
I found an old Norton rescue disk which seemed to fix some problems.
Then a combination of a recovery floppy and recovery CD enabled me to
reinstall windows ME. I have then managed to upgrade to windows XP.

I have a new challenge however!
The hard drive only recognises 40GB of space (the size of the old one)
whereas my new drive is 200GB. Any ideas on how I can help it to see the new
space?
PS: I realise that one fact in my previous post was wrong - I am using NTFS,
not FAT32 file system.
 
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