Install XP, XP CD not recognised from Boot

Hi All

I have friend's PC which was reporting errors and had to be rebooted regularly. We decided the best option was to reformat the machine and start again. So after backing up all data I reformatted his hard drive and then reinstalled Windows Professional from the genuine CD. It loaded but not successfully and as a result I noticed the nasty window "recovered from a serious error message" to send Microsoft, which I didn't. I therefore decided to try and repair the installation using the tool on Microsoft Windows XP professional installation (after install). This appeared to work again, however when I rebooted I noticed errors. I decided to totally reinstall and reformat the hard drive and start again. This time different files were reported as not being accessible and when the system booted it again had errors and after I tried to close the system I had a big blue screen of death. So again I tried to format and install Windows XP.

The computer now boots from the Windows CD but then the it asks me to insert a genuine Windows CD (which it has just booted from). I have tried to use the repair choice on the menu which gives me a DOS prompt and limited commands. From this prompt I can see the C drive. When I boot using a DOS boot disk I can only see the A drive B drive and the two CD drives which are labelled X and Y, yet when I boot from the Windows CD they are labelled E & F.

I do not know what to do next to try and install Windows X P. Any help please would be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance

Tim

Timm

Newbie Poster

7 posts since Dec 2004

Reputation Points: 10

Solved Threads: 0

7 Years Ago

check bootup settings in your bios should be as follows

HARD DRIVE 1. FLOPPY DISK 2. DISABLE ALL OTHERS

alan marsden