Re: Unable to restore from recovery partition

A couple of comments:

I suspect that either your Dell "Reinstallation CD" or the optical drive in your
2650 is defective. The 2650 does know how to boot from a CD. I have serviced
them and refurbished them. Good thing, too, 'cause it's not easy to start an XP
install from floppy. In fact, I have never seen XP boot floppies. But they may
exist.

Second, you might as well forget installing Windows from a USB device. Bill
Gates, Steve Ballmer, and their galley slaves have made it almost impossible to
do. In fact, I have not yet seen a "how to" for successful XP install.

Linux? Yep, it can be installed from a USB device... Ben Myers

On Sun, 14 Sep 2008 11:40:14 -0700 (PDT), Fred the Red Shirt
<fredfighter@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Sep 13, 10:43 am, Ben Myers <ben_myers_spam_me_...@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

...

I get a nice warm cuddly feeling from a Dell "Reinstallation CD", which is
nothing more than a standard everyday Microsoft Windows install CD except for a
file or two that identifies it as a Dell.  Anyone and everyone should spend a
few extra bucks to buy the Reinstallation CD, either when placing an on-line
order or after buying a Dell in one of the many mass market outlets.
...

I have one of those for Windows XP Home.

The instructions in the manual say to insert the CD and reboot.

The PC (an old DELL Inspiron 2650) does not boot from the CD.
But if I boot in safemode, I can explore the CD. If I try to
install however, I get a pop up that tells me to insert the CD
and reboot. Deja Vue all over again.

I tried coying the reinstallation CD to a USB flash drive and
then tried installing it from there. I got a message saying that
the current OS is more recent than the reinstallation CD an
it refused to install. I uninstalled SP2 and tried again, same
message. I tried to uninstall SP1 and the uninstall failed, now
I can only boot in safemode.

I used F2 to try to change the boot device sequence, but when
scrolling, the menu skips over the CD-ROM and will not let me
designate it as a boot device.

I read that I could download XP setup floppies, then boot off
the floppy drive, enter repair console and then designate the
CD-Rom as a boot device.

I have successfully booted from the floppies, but do not understand
HOW to use the repair console to edit the boot device sequence.

It looks like the set command might do it, but I am locked out of the
set command unless something else (a snap in???) is installed.

Maybe bootcfg would do it, but I haven't found the proper syntax.

A hardware solution was also suggested-removing the battery from
the motherboard to reset the bios to default. I almost got the case
open, but something near where the wifi would plug in seems to
be caught and I don't think I can get to the motherboard without
breaking something.

So, am I almost there? What do I do next?

The laptop was a gift from a friend, I have all of the original
paperwork etc.

I suppose that locking the boot device sequence to disallow
the removable media devices is some sort of security measure.
That is particularly annoying as the previous owner/user had
never even set passwords.

If I finally give up on trying to restore XP home, I may install
Win 2kPro, there is nothing on the hard drive that I actually
want or need and I downloaded and erased all of my friend's
data.
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Windows Update Failure; Tech Abaondoned Me
    ... I did not think about Dell technical support, ... MS will provide support for the OS if you install it. ... Create A Bootable/Slipstreamed Windows XP Installation CD ... Reinstallation disc and after it finished it still had the same error message ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsupdate)
  • Re: Swapping Laptop Hard drives
    ... any OEM copy of windows will install on any machine HOWEVER if you install say a Dell copy of XP on a HP/aACer/Whatever you will need to activate windows and provide a 25 hexadecimal key. ... On an Acer package I bought a couple of years ago, the restore disc supplied will *not* work except on an Acer machine, ditto with a Toshiba I've tried recently. ... machine I worked on a while ago actually needed the boot sector of a replacement HD "branding" with a key to match the motherboard before it would even consider using it as a boot device. ...
    (uk.comp.sys.laptops)
  • Re: Boot failure after power failure
    ... a fresh install of WinXP and you will need to visit Windows Update after you ... How to perform an in-place upgrade (reinstallation) of Windows XP ... > Now the computer won't boot. ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.general)
  • Re: Inspiron 1150 reinstallation CD problems
    ... The Dell "reinstallation' CD is nothing more than the usual garden variety ... Windows install CD with a couple of very small Dell-specific changes to allow ... That is where the Drivers CD comes in. ...
    (alt.sys.pc-clone.dell)
  • Re: HELP .. serious !!!
    ... Last Dell tech replaced the hard drive with OS on it. ... Still same DISK ERROR after post. ... On boot, hit F12 to get boot selection screen, and ... boot to WinXP install CD. ...
    (alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt)