Install XP Without CD Drive or Flash Drive

[faint545]

I ran into this problem at work today and I found an easy work around rather than the ones I read about online. This is a solution if you have a machine (in my case a laptop) that can't boot from USB CD drive or flash but can boot into a USB floppy or a similar situation.

My Situation:
A Toshiba laptop that does not have built in CD drive or floppy drive. The machine also can not boot from USB CD or flash but CAN boot from USB floppy. This was specified in the user manual for this specific laptop.

Things you need:
1) Floppy drive & floppy disks(USB is OK)
2) Windows XP CD
3) IDE/SATA to USB adapter
4) Pre-existing Windows XP machine.
5) SMARTDRIVE: (ftp://ftp.nnov.net/pub/software/dos/...S/SMARTDRV.EXE)
6) XMSMMGR.EXE: (http://www.petr.isibrno.cz/archive/s...95/xmsmmgr.exe)

The Process:
Basically this is what you will do.
1) Create a DOS floppy disk.
2) Format & partition desired hard drive.
3) Copy contents of Windows XP CD to hard drive partition.
4) Boot into DOS using floppy disk.
5) Navigate to partitioned drive and locate I386 folder and run WINNT.EXE.

In Detail:
1) If you have a USB floppy, plug it into a pre-existing Windows XP machine and insert a floppy disk. Right click on the floppy drive and select "Format" and check the option "Create an MS-DOS startup disk." Then copy the files SMARTDRV.EXE and XMSMMGR.EXE to the floppy.

2) With your IDE/SATA to USB adapter, plug in the hard drive you wish to have XP installed on into the pre-existing Windows XP machine. Using your favorite partitioning tool, you will create 2 partitions on this drive. First partition will be small (~2GB) and it will be a FAT32 partition. The second partition will be the size of the remaining disk and it can be untouched. It will get formatted eventually.

3) Now, copy ALL the contents of your Windows XP CD to the 2GB partition and install the hard dive back into the machine it came from.

4) Boot the machine into DOS using the floppy disk and once in DOS, run SMARTDRV.EXE.

5) Then navigate to the hard drive (probably C:\) and go to the I386 folder and run WINNT.EXE. Then follow directions from there.

I hope this helps others.

[Dan Penny]

#1 under "The Process";

Most machines today do not have a floppy drive.

[quartet-man]

Originally Posted by Dan Penny #1 under "The Process"; Most machines today do not have a floppy drive.

That is why a usb floppy was mentioned I presume.

[faint545]

That is why a usb floppy was mentioned I presume.

Yes. In my case I had to use a USB floppy.

Also, you must set the 2GB partition as active in order for it to boot.

[a0archie]

wow! let me try this one. have you guys tried it with ubuntu as well?

[buildingit]

Hello! I just saw this post "Install XP..." and my ears perked up really fast. I want to share what happened to me in case it hurts someone else.

I re-installed XP invoving a situation where the secondaryb hardrive had more than- I forget- 150 GB or something. And because I didn't used the lastest version of XP, it did not recognize the hardrive but it wrote over it's boot sector anyway and it screwed up the entire drive. I lost my data forever.

This large drive was my so-called back up drive- just data, no OS. But it was attached to my computer at the time I was installing XP onto the main drive. I canceled the operation as soon as it said something about not recognizing the harddrive but it was too late. The data is still in there somewhere but because the boot portion was overwritten it will cost me $600 to have it fixed and even then no guarantees. So be careful!

[rwc1965]

Thank You very much for this priceless info it is what I needed to see for my situation. http://www.pcmech.com/forum/images/smilies/smile.gif

[Ejvind]

This seems to do the trick when trying to re-install windows, without the hassle of reformatting and doing the whole backup procedure. I did do a backup first though :-)
Ejvind

[MikeMoss]

I re-installed XP invoving a situation where the secondaryb hardrive had more than- I forget- 150 GB or something. And because I didn't used the lastest version of XP, it did not recognize the hardrive but it wrote over it's boot sector anyway and it screwed up the entire drive. I lost my data forever.

Is there any possibility that EasyBCD could rebuild the boot sector on your drive and make it possible to read it again.

Download EasyBCD 2.0.2 - NeoSmart Technologies

I don't know, just a thought.

[buildingit]

hmm Thank you Mike Moss I will give it a try. I unplugged the drive a year ago now and still haven't dealt with it.

[renowilliams]

This reminds me of days gone by when I would when loading windows 98,format the drive and make it bootable with the /"s" switch and copy the cab files over. Put the drive back into the original machine and install from the drive.