Upgrade to Win2K Pro from Win98SE - USB CD drive issue

[Jay]

Hopefully someone here can help -- the HP tech support
folks certainly did not.

I'm attempting to upgrade my laptop (HP Omnibook 500 w/o
integrated CD-ROM) from Win98SE to Win2K Pro and using an
external USB CD-ROM (HP CD-Writer 8220e).

When attempting the upgrade, the first time the laptop
reboots during the install routine, I ask for it to
continue install of Win2K. From there, it reports that it
cannot find a CD-ROM drive and that Setup cannot continue,
even though the HP external drive is on and connected.

I've installed all of HP's latest USB patches and drivers
for this drive for Win98, but they've been applied in that
environment; however, this resembles a DOS environment now
at this stage in the upgrade and the drive won't fire up.

I also have an EXP DVD/CD combo drive that connects
through the PCMCIA slot. I installed drivers that allow
for a "DOS Boot" for this drive, but the Win2K Setup
doesn't recognize this as a drive either, although it
works fine in Win98 as an external drive.

I've tried the four boot disks for Win2K and it gets me
beyond this, but later I get a blue screen reporting
something about an invalid I/O device (I assume it's
saying I still don't have a CD drive attached). Then the
system locks up.

Thus, I'm stalled in my pursuit out of Win98 Hell. Any
ideas? Thank you.

 

[Greg]

Jay,

try hookinig the floppy drive with the cable to the back
of the laptop and have the dis drive in place then start
the system with the disks in and then after you get thru
the 4th disk it should take the cd.

 

[Guest]

Thanks for the reply, Greg. I did all that, and after the
last boot disk is processed (with "Starting Windwows 2000"
as the caption), it's still giving me a blue screen with
an INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE error, and I have to do a cold
reboot.

I welcome any and every theory (conspiracy or otherwise)
as I've been fiddling with this thing off and on for three
months. It's just been less painful to keep the Win98SE,
but one more page fault there and I'll throw the whole
thing out the window.

Thanks.