I have a laptop which does not have a floppy or workng CD drive. BUT I do have a working external cd drive!

I have had a problem - probably virus related - and via another laptop, that has space for 2 drives, I have formatted the offending hard drive (NTFS).

So now I need to re-install windows XP or something that will recognise the working external cd drive - from which I can install XP.

I have been looking at the tutorial on this web site about how to reinstall windows without a floppy or cd drive. I do not seem to be able to go the FAT route as this option is not available when formatting.

So - I need to get something that will kick-off the install process and recognise the external CD drive.

Could I install WIN98 on the hard drive whilst in the other laptop - remove it and put it back in the old laptop and then use that as a start point?

That sounds like it would work, Win98 is fat32 and if should recognize your External CD drive. Let me know how it goes.

You should be able to install XP while in the other machine. Go through the install process, after it has copied the files and wants to reboot, shut it down and move the drive to the other computer and finish the install process. This should work and give you the ability to use NTFS format, which is more stable than FAT.

this question is asked often, simply load the setup files (XP) and when the computer attemtps it's first restart, hold the power button to prevent it from restarting, once this is completed, remove the drive and place back in the original laptop. This should ensure the correct hardware is loaded on your OS.

98 requires a boot disk but should have the same general setup.


An external cd drive can only work if your motherboard/bios supports booting from a usb device, you can check this in your bios by looking at the boot order, if usb is not in the list, then this is not an option.

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