Going back from winxp to win98se without a floppy drive?

[Jimmy Little]

Hi I have a friends laptop that has winXP installed, the laptop is a PII and is not really designed for windows XP according to the HP website, with windows XP installed the laptops USB port does not work, and only a windows 2000 bios flash can get this to work, but is not supported and is a gamble my friend does not wish to take for whatever reason.. so he wants to go back to windows 98se… he does not have a floppy drive to use a win98 bootdisk from so how is the best way to get win98se back on this laptop?

Thanks Booby

[Stoo]

Booby? *snigger*


The win98 cd should be bootable..

If not, then you can always create a bootcd in something like nero..

If that fails then you could always extract the hdd, and connect it up to a normal pc (ide adaptor, or one of those usb 2.5" drive enclosures), format it and manually copy the files across..

[EvilMunky]

Windows 98 wont run that much better than winxp would on it.

Maybe win 2000 pro is a better solution - thats what i would put on

[myth]

win 95! That would be better....

[Jimmy Little]

ok ok...

win2000 or XP don't allow the USB port to work, it's a known issue with this HP laptop.. so i need to get back to win98se and i don't have the use of any USB devices or floppy drives..

So bootible cd is the way to go?

and yeah i saw the booby bit... but it was to late! editing is for wimps!

[directhex]

win98 cd, boot it, ask for boot disk w/ cd support, run format c: from d:\win98 (i think), reboot, boot the cd, go straight to setup

[Jimmy Little]

thanks bud, i will try that...

[Howard]

Windows 98 wont run that much better than winxp would on it.

Maybe win 2000 pro is a better solution - thats what i would put on

LMAO are you kidding?

A PII would be great for Win98! XP needs at least a 400MHz processor and 128MB of RAM to run nicely enough.


And yes the Win98 CD will be bootable.

Once you've formatted, if you want it to install quicker, and never ask you for the location of the CAB files for it's drivers again, then once you've formatted, make the directory "C:\Windows\Options\Cabs" by typing "md windows\options\cabs" in the DOS prompt, then type "cd" and press F3 for easy navigation to that folder.

Then type copy d:\win98 or whatever drive the Win98 CD is in.
Once that's finished, run setup.exe from that folder. It'll be quicker, and Windows will know where the CAB files are for future reference

Also, when it asks which directory to install Windows in, it might default to "C:\Windows.000" or somehting, just change that to "C:\Windows"

[Jimmy Little]

seems i have a problem! the bios password is 'not known' and my friend brought this from someone on ebay who does not know the bios password, so it won't bite with the cd in the drive will it?

[EvilMunky]

[QUOTE=Howard]LMAO are you kidding?

A PII would be great for Win98! XP needs at least a 400MHz processor and 128MB of RAM to run nicely enough.

I say that because thats what i do. I run XP on a old low end p2. Works fine if you know how to confgre and set things up properly.........Took some titting about to get it on in the first place but works fine oncew its on. Then you have the added bonus of being able to get updates etc etc.

Dont get me wrong - win98 was my fave operating system for ages - but its time in my opinion (note the my opinion bit) has come, and gone.......

[Howard]

Stick the CD in and boot up.. You might be lucky and it might boot from the CD

[EvilMunky]

seems i have a problem! the bios password is 'not known' and my friend brought this from someone on ebay who does not know the bios password, so it won't bite with the cd in the drive will it?

There are loads of ways around the bios password...............what have you tried.

[Howard]

[QUOTE=EvilMunky]

LMAO are you kidding?

A PII would be great for Win98! XP needs at least a 400MHz processor and 128MB of RAM to run nicely enough.

I say that because thats what i do. I run XP on a old low end p2. Works fine if you know how to confgre and set things up properly.........Took some titting about to get it on in the first place but works fine oncew its on. Then you have the added bonus of being able to get updates etc etc.

Dont get me wrong - win98 was my fave operating system for ages - but its time in my opinion (note the my opinion bit) has come, and gone.......

What point are you trying to make exactly?

You said Windows 98 won't run any better on an old computer than XP... I beg to differ

[Jimmy Little]

There are loads of ways around the bios password...............what have you tried.

none! as yet

[santana]

Do you mind the file system you got? Have you converted it from Fat32 to NTFS? If yes, you may forget about Win 98 and Win 93

And again, XP is quite a stupid thing but i'm 100% sure it must work with PII.
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[Butuz]

You can just fdisk the file system once you have booted into dos using the win98 bootable cd. Having NTFS partitions is no problem because you can recreate them as fat32 partitions. Mind you, if you have multiple partitions for data and they are NTFS, then your in trouble and will have to buy some Win98NTFS type fotware that people sell.

Butuz