Install XP without a CD drive?

[loafoftoast]

I have an old Panasonic Toughbook CF-27. I've been having trouble trying to install Windows XP on to it. It does not have a CD drive, can't boot from USB, and no Floppy either.

I've managed to install XP via upgrade from 98SE, but I am wondering if there is a way to do a fresh install?

[ReDFoX2200]

I had some smiler problem some time back, but I will tell you what I did maybe it would help u.

Create a new partition and copy the xp folder to it.

now u need to boot in dos mode (if ur currently using win 98 shutdown and select restart in dos mode).

now format ur "C" partition in command line

now try to run setup manually from the other partition buy running to setup.exe under 386 folder

[loafoftoast]

Right on, Thanks - I will try this out as soon as I can. A friend and I are installing the Toughbook into his car, and he's not here.

Do you know how to shrink the XP install disk? I have used nLite once before, but I wasn't that sure if I should be removing everything that I did.

[Panacik]

I had some smiler problem some time back, but I will tell you what I did maybe it would help u.

Create a new partition and copy the xp folder to it.

now u need to boot in dos mode (if ur currently using win 98 shutdown and select restart in dos mode).

now format ur "C" partition in command line

now try to run setup manually from the other partition buy running to setup.exe under 386 folder

And where exactly will he get the i386 folder magically from? he still needs to be able to copy the files form a disk or something. The only way it seems he can do this, is from a floppy, which is crazy.

Right on, Thanks - I will try this out as soon as I can. A friend and I are installing the Toughbook into his car, and he's not here.

Do you know how to shrink the XP install disk? I have used nLite once before, but I wasn't that sure if I should be removing everything that I did.

I would recomment against this, unless you have a way to transfer your CP files to another partition?

I do have one suggestion though. If you can boot from floppy, you could format the partition as fat or fat32 then make grub4dos your bootloader.

Through grub4dos, you can manually hook to the pen drive and load a PE environment,, which should then allow you to load XP, if you have a copy of the i386 folder on there.

The other more messy way, would be to floppy boot in to DOS and load the drivers needed to see a pen drive in dos, then run the setup from dos on the pen drive. Look at these sites for resources on this:

http://www.stefan2000.com/darkehorse...S/Drivers/USB/

http://www.bootdisk.com/usb.htm

http://www.google.it/search?q=cache:...S/Drivers/USB/

However, let me know if you want more information on GRUB4DOS and ill be pleased to help as far as i can.

[ReDFoX2200]

He seems to have an OS running on his system, from there he should get his partition ready and copy files.

[loafoftoast]

So, just an update. I managed to do it. It took a couple tries, and a few hours to do.

- I installed DOS7.1 on the hard drive using the physical laptop drive in VMware Workstation. (On a separate PC)

- I then copied the entire contents of Windows 98, and Windows XP disks into separate folders on the drive.

- Installed Windows 98 using DOS.

- Then upgraded to XP by running the setup in the XP folder on the drive.

Since it worked I didn't feel the need to do a fresh install.

I did however make a custom XP CD using nLite, just because I think a full install of XP and all its features would slow it down. The toughbook is only a Pentium II with 192 MB memory.

The Screen and Laptop are separated, the rest of the Laptop is sitting underneath the dashboard.

[Panacik]

So, just an update. I managed to do it. It took a couple tries, and a few hours to do.

- I installed DOS7.1 on the hard drive using the physical laptop drive in VMware Workstation. (On a separate PC)

- I then copied the entire contents of Windows 98, and Windows XP disks into separate folders on the drive.

- Installed Windows 98 using DOS.

- Then upgraded to XP by running the setup in the XP folder on the drive.

Since it worked I didn't feel the need to do a fresh install.

I did however make a custom XP CD using nLite, just because I think a full install of XP and all its features would slow it down. The toughbook is only a Pentium II with 192 MB memory.

The Screen and Laptop are separated, the rest of the Laptop is sitting underneath the dashboard.

Cool, glad you got there mate.

That setup looks great... but what are you going to use it for?

[lemonbear]

It's gonna be a monitoring system which provides him with feedback on where the speed cameras/police patrols are so that he can go street racing without getting caught.

[Panacik]

It's gonna be a monitoring system which provides him with feedback on where the speed cameras/police patrols are so that he can go street racing without getting caught.

Right? So he could have just bought a Tomtom and installed the camera application to it...

Seriously dude, that was a poor attempt at a joke from you...

[loafoftoast]

Thanks,

We're playing with hydrogen, so it's being used to monitor exactly what the car is doing using software.

Its also the new radio. lol

[Panacik]

Thanks,

We're playing with hydrogen, so it's being used to monitor exactly what the car is doing using software.

Its also the new radio. lol

Wow! Now that is cool!

Post some screenies of it in action mate!

[RobC]

Thanks,

We're playing with hydrogen,

Well we shouldn't be making light of this.

[San Mao]

What I did in the past, create a Ghost Image of a partition with i386 folder in it, follow by cloning image to partition with Ghost boot disc (Floppy)

My 1st post :)