I feel your pain. The whole "must boot to CD to install" paradigm that XP
and now Vista use is a real PITA. I *believe* there are ways around it, but
I'm not certain. The place to ask is in XP newsgroup(s).

I assume that you already know that when the XP CD boots, you get a prompt
to "Press any key to boot from CD", and if you don't do that within
something like 5 seconds, it skips booting and proceeds to the next boot
device. Perhaps you could try repeatedly pressing the <enter> key while the
system is booting and see if that catches it. (Don't hold down the key, as
that will result in a "stuck key" error.)

I haven't worked with an eMachine in a long time. Is the XP CD a standard
OEM distro, or does is it perhaps a "restore" CD that requires come other
method? Also, can you get your hands on another XP CD (standard OEM edition)
to try?

Lastly, I would consider making a copy of the CD using another machine (or a
98 installation on this machine, if necessary). Straight Disk Copy is
required, can't copy contents to HD and then to new CD. Might also try
cleaning the CD using dilute dish soap solution, rinsing and drying, and
then polishing it with a standard liquid car wax, always wiping from center
to edge. That will fill any scratches on the underside that might be
blocking proper reading, though it's scratches to the label side that cause
irrevocable loss of data.

See if the procedure described below, substituting the unavailable
boot-floppy for the Utility-CD, is something you want to try. But it is
suspect that you can't boot from the WinXP CD, when you can boot from
other bootable media in the drives.

    [quote] from CQuirke (so it must be true):

I've been installing XP from DOS mode diskette boot with CD-ROM driver
support, just as the poster describes.  Here's the logic...

H:\i386\WinNT.exe  /u:C:\CQSetup.txt  /s:H:\i386

...where H: is the CD drive, and C:\CQSetup.txt is the answer file.  I
don't think you need to use an answer file for this to work; the trick
is most likely to be using the right executable to start the
installation, e.g. WINNT.EXE and not WINNT32.EXE

    [/quote]

from <news:j0evf198j4ldo2eid9eu2pjf1kq8r7anen@4ax.com> in
'microsoft.public.windowsxp.general' where they might be able to help
answer why the OP's, Tingers, WinXP-disc doesn't work to boot from in
the first place. (P.S. I haven't used this procedure myself.)

<snip>

The best way to install XP is by booting with the CD of course.
Since for whatever reason the cd won't boot...
the next best alternative is to go to the Microsoft website and download
a set of XP_install boot floppies.
that should do the trick.

BTW: Another respondent mentioned the use of a standard win9x boot floppy.

That will work but running   winnt from the i386 folder...

but 1)  you need to first load smartdrv
and 2) the HD must have a fat32 partition...

so you are better off with the Microsoft boot floppies

Y'all have reminded me of the possibilities, now. Blame CRS.