Partitioning a HD with win 98 with windows xp CD-Rom

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Ken - 30 Oct 2007 00:42 GMT

My question is this. I have a hard drive that won't boot and has windows 98
(not sure what edititon). The motherboard still boots, and I have it set up
to boot from CD-ROM. When I put my windows xp pro CD in, it attempts to boot
from it and fails. I seem to recall last time I played with 98 years and
years ago, that I needed a boot disk on a floppy. This will be very
inconvenient for me to get now, and I was wondering if there is a way to get
around it, so that I can use the windows Xp pro CD in the rom, to boot up to
the partition screen so that i may attempt to repartition the drive to
windows XP?

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Ron Badour - 30 Oct 2007 02:29 GMT

Go into the BIOS and make sure the CDRom drive is the first boot device.
Then boot with the XP CD in the drive and follow the on screen prompts. I
am not sure what you want to do as there is no such thing as "repartition
the drive to Windows XP."

Why is it inconvenient--you can make a boot disk with the Fat32ebd.exe file
located on the W98 CD: tools/mtsutil/fat32ebd or you can download one from
several places on the net.

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Regards

Ron Badour
MS MVP 1997 - 2008

> My question is this. I have a hard drive that won't boot and has windows
> 98
[quoted text clipped - 10 lines]
> the partition screen so that i may attempt to repartition the drive to
> windows XP?

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Ken - 30 Oct 2007 03:09 GMT

Sorry Ron, thank you for the reply, and let me be a bit more specific.

It is inconvenient because I am trying to walk a friend through it across
the country, and even though a boot disk is simple enough to make, the more
steps for him, the harder. Also, he does not have a floppy, and though he
has a drive to make one with on another computer, he doesn't have a disk, and
is attempting to acquire one without buying a 50 pack at the moment. I
didn't mean to say repartition. I wish to use the windows XP disk to
partition the drive and install windows XP to see if the hard drive will work
properly once this is done. He does not have the windows 98 CD, he has a
Windows XP Pro CD and that alone. If there is a way to make a boot disk from
DOS on the PC with the corrupted OS that may help, but like you said it is
easy to find to D/L online. The biggest thing is he just doesn't have a
floppy laying around.

That said, I had already had him disable quick boot and disable all other
boot devices leaving the CD-ROM as primary boot device. He says that when it
restarts with Win XP CD in the rom, it quickly shows the To Boot from CD rom
msg, but then says boot failure. Any ideas why that may occur?

Thank you again,

Ken~

> Go into the BIOS and make sure the CDRom drive is the first boot device.
> Then boot with the XP CD in the drive and follow the on screen prompts. I
[quoted text clipped - 19 lines]
> > the partition screen so that i may attempt to repartition the drive to
> > windows XP?

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Lil' Dave - 30 Oct 2007 03:10 GMT

What do you mean "it attempts to boot
from it and fails"? Indications leading to that conclusion?
Is the XP install CD meant for a specific PC, or retail, retail upgrade, or
generic OEM?

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Dave
Profound is we're here due to a chance arrangement
of chemicals in the ocean billions of years ago.
More profound is we made it to the top of the food
chain per our reasoning abilities.
Most profound is the denial of why we may
be on the way out.

> My question is this. I have a hard drive that won't boot and has windows
> 98
[quoted text clipped - 10 lines]
> the partition screen so that i may attempt to repartition the drive to
> windows XP?

Reply to this Message

Ken - 30 Oct 2007 03:40 GMT

Lil Dave, I mean that it is set in the BIOS to boot from CD-ROM only and its
trying to, doing the whole "press any key from CD-ROM" but when you do, it
says boot failure, and some other stuff. So its trying to read the CD and it
isn't and I was under the impression from years back that it was because Win
98 needed a boot floppy to read from CD-rom. So thats why i've posted my
post. To try to find a way to boot from CD-ROM and not need a floppy, since
my buddy doesn't have a floppy in sight lol.

> What do you mean "it attempts to boot
> from it and fails"? Indications leading to that conclusion?
[quoted text clipped - 15 lines]
> > the partition screen so that i may attempt to repartition the drive to
> > windows XP?

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Ron Badour - 30 Oct 2007 04:02 GMT

The XP pro CD is bootable and does not require a floppy disk. Retail
versions of W98 were not bootable and required a floppy containing CD
drivers but in the case you are describing, it doesn't matter that W98 was
on the PC. My best guess is that your friend is either doing something
wrong or the drive has failed.

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Regards

Ron Badour
MS MVP 1997 - 2008

> Lil Dave, I mean that it is set in the BIOS to boot from CD-ROM only and
> its
[quoted text clipped - 34 lines]
>> > the partition screen so that i may attempt to repartition the drive to
>> > windows XP?

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Ken - 30 Oct 2007 07:28 GMT

Crap.. well, he is sure the ROM works, and I am not sure what else he can be
doing wrong. I mean I AM helping him over the phone with isn't the greatest
thing, but, besides making sure the ROM is the primary boot device and has
the windows xp pro CD in it.. what else can there be to do? I mean the BIOS
work, so the motherboard should be functional to the point of at least
partitioning a drive... it tries to boot up win 98 and freezes.. so its
really seeming like the hard drive just needs a whipe. I just don't know
what else to tell him to try. Any advice? Would the boot disk be worth a
shot, or totally pointless?

Thanks for all your help thus far Ron.

> The XP pro CD is bootable and does not require a floppy disk. Retail
> versions of W98 were not bootable and required a floppy containing CD
[quoted text clipped - 40 lines]
> >> > the partition screen so that i may attempt to repartition the drive to
> >> > windows XP?

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Jeff Richards - 30 Oct 2007 09:21 GMT

If the machine freezes trying to boot W98 from the hard drive, and if it
says boot failure part way through the process of starting the XP setup CD,
then that indicates a hardware problem that is independent of both the hard
drive and the CD, such as RAM.

What brought about this problem in the first place, and if that was a
hardware failure of some sort are you sure it is now fixed?

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Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)

> Crap.. well, he is sure the ROM works, and I am not sure what else he can
> be
[quoted text clipped - 10 lines]
>
> Thanks for all your help thus far Ron.

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Don Phillipson - 30 Oct 2007 11:42 GMT

> Crap.. well, he is sure the ROM works, and I am not sure what else he can be
> doing wrong. I mean I AM helping him over the phone with isn't the greatest
> thing, but, besides making sure the ROM is the primary boot device and has
> the windows xp pro CD in it.. what else can there be to do?

We understand this is an old PC (first with Win98.) Your
friend should also consider that CD drives do not last for
ever (but are both cheap and easy to replace). Failure to
boot XP from a CD drives requires that we consider whether
the drive is in full working order.

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Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)

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Lil' Dave - 30 Oct 2007 10:39 GMT

My interest leans toward what the "some other stuff" says. Could be
hardware, could be simply a little dust, or scratch on the XP CD itself.

If you're insistent on booting from an equivalent 98/98SE floppy off CD, can
be made by the user. Need a floppy drive and burner, and the burner
software that can make bootable CDs. Also, think bootdisk.com has an image
file with similar contents, burn with software for burning images to CD.
Floppy not needed in that case.

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