Hello,

I have an old Dell Latitude that I would like to reformat and reinstall XP on, but I do not have the original clean install disks. It currently has two operating systems offered at startup, 2000 and XP. I assume the hard drive is partitioned to enable this, and I want to make sure that I eliminate all remnants of 2000 and this partition prior to reinstallation of XP to ensure the best possible performance.

Can someone walk me through this or direct me to step-by-step instructions?

Thanks in advance...

Jean

I'm confused as to whether you have the install disks for XP. You state you don't and imply you do.

If you do not have The XP installation disks, I would suggest "Partition Magic".

If you do have the install disks, see this site: How to partition and format a hard disk in Windows XP (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/313348).

If the drive is a Western Digital, you could use their "Data Lifeguard" program instead. It is available at their site and is very user friendly.

You can remove the Windows 2000 installation without having to format and start all over.

In your Windows XP installation, open My Computer, expand the C: drive and select Tools and then Folder Options from the menu. Click the View tab and select the button for View hidden files and folders.

Navigate to the root of the C: drive and look for the BOOT.INI file. Right-click on the BOOT.INI file and select Open With. Choose Notepad and open the file.

Copy the contents of the file to a new post and reply. This will help determine a course of action. You should see something like:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOW S
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn

I'm confused as to whether you have the install disks for XP. You state you don't and imply you do.

If you do not have The XP installation disks, I would suggest "Partition Magic".

If you do have the install disks, see this site: How to partition and format a hard disk in Windows XP (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/313348).

If the drive is a Western Digital, you could use their "Data Lifeguard" program instead. It is available at their site and is very user friendly.

I don't have the original disks that came with the computer but I do have XP to install.

You can remove the Windows 2000 installation without having to format and start all over.

In your Windows XP installation, open My Computer, expand the C: drive and select Tools and then Folder Options from the menu. Click the View tab and select the button for View hidden files and folders.

Navigate to the root of the C: drive and look for the BOOT.INI file. Right-click on the BOOT.INI file and select Open With. Choose Notepad and open the file.

Copy the contents of the file to a new post and reply back. This will help determine a course of action. You should see something like:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOW S
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn

Thank you. I found this file C:\WINDOWS\pss\boot.ini.backup


[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOW S
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Micro soft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional" /fastdetect

You can remove the Windows 2000 installation without having to format and start all over.

In your Windows XP installation, open My Computer, expand the C: drive and select Tools and then Folder Options from the menu. Click the View tab and select the button for View hidden files and folders.

Navigate to the root of the C: drive and look for the BOOT.INI file. Right-click on the BOOT.INI file and select Open With. Choose Notepad and open the file.

Copy the contents of the file to a new post and reply back. This will help determine a course of action. You should see something like:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOW S
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn


But in addition I should note that a clean wipe is desired, the machine is failing often and I want to start with a clean slate. I am just looking to get the most complete solution with minimum effort... of course ;)

Set your bios in the laptop to boot to the cd rom first.
Hit any key to begin setup
Once in the windows xp setup and windows finds your current operating system you will then need to delete all partitions and then restart the computer. The reason for the restart is to remove any extra boot entries.
Once you reboot hit any key to enter setup and then it should ask were you would like to install windows and you chose unpartitioned space choose your format options quick or full. Once the drive is formated the rest of the OS is automated. Once windows completes make sure to check your device manager to see what drivers need to be loaded. Go to dell and under support download the drivers for xp.

Have fun
George
Thegeekbusters.com

Your boot.ini file shows that both of your Windows 2000 and Windows XP are installed to the same partition. It is likely that you do not even have the Dell diagnostics partion installed becaused if you did, your Partition() option would be 2 instead of 1.

This means that you can boot to the Windows XP installation CD without having to worry about removing other partitions first. BEFORE you start the installation, turn your laptop over and write down the Service Tag number. Then go online and download the drivers for that Service Tag. Write them all to a CD so that you will have them handy to perform your new installation.

Dell Drivers and Downloads (http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/index.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&~ck=mn&SvcTag=&SysID=DJ_DIGITAL_MP)

Your boot.ini file shows that both of your Windows 2000 and Windows XP are installed to the same partition. It is likely that you do not even have the Dell diagnostics partion installed becaused if you did, your Partition() option would be 2 instead of 1.

This means that you can boot to the Windows XP installation CD without having to worry about removing other partitions first. BEFORE you start the installation, turn your laptop over and write down the Service Tag number. Then go online and download the drivers for that Service Tag. Write them all to a CD so that you will have them handy to perform your new installation.

Dell Drivers and Downloads (http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/index.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&~ck=mn&SvcTag=&SysID=DJ_DIGITAL_MP)

Thanks a bunch. One last thing: there is no optical drive on this laptop, only an external. I will try to boot from that this evening but if that is not automatic, what do I do?

Do you have a USB memory stick that is at least 512MB (preferably 1GB)? You can make it bootable and install from that. Or use an external CD-ROM. It is not as easy to install from the hard drive. You would have to remove the drive and connect it to anther PC. You can use a USB to hard disk cable with an adapter cable. First, you will need to reboot the laptop and see if you have the option to hit F12 for a boot menu where you can select a CD-ROM or USB boot device.

USB to IDE/SATA Adapters (http://www.cdw.com/shop/search/results.aspx?key=usb+to+ide+adapter&platform=PC&sr=1&Find+it.x=48&Find+it.y=9)

Do you have a USB memory stick that is at least 512MB (preferably 1GB)? You can make it bootable and install from that. Or use an external CD-ROM. It is not as easy to install from the hard drive. You would have to remove the drive and connect it to anther PC. You can use a USB to hard disk cable with an adapter cable. First, you will need to reboot the laptop and see if you have the option to hit F12 for a boot menu where you can select a CD-ROM or USB boot device.

USB to IDE/SATA Adapters (http://www.cdw.com/shop/search/results.aspx?key=usb+to+ide+adapter&platform=PC&sr=1&Find+it.x=48&Find+it.y=9)

Unfortunately I discovered over the weekend that there is no usb option in the bios, even after updating it to the most recent version from dell. I am curious what the clean install process was intended to be from the outset?

Dell uses a hard disk installation method for OEM computers. It takes a bit of time and patience to build one but once it is done, an image is made of it. Then when new machines are sold, the drives are imaged in a matter of minutes and the machine is ready to ship.

Dell uses a hard disk installation method for OEM computers. It takes a bit of time and patience to build one but once it is done, an image is made of it. Then when new machines are sold, the drives are imaged in a matter of minutes and the machine is ready to ship.

I guess what I meant to ask is in this case, what would the manual tell me to do to perform a clean install? I've never had a computer without recovery disks (or a drive for that matter) and I am reluctant to believe there is no way to return the machine to its original state. Am I missing something? Might there be something on the hard drive that will perform this function?

When I try to just install xp from my disk manually (i.e. not booting from it, just opening the disk from windows) it says that the version on the computer is newer and therefore it won't take.

Thanks for your time!

You can not perform a "downgrade" to a previous service pack level directly from Windows. You have no CD-ROM drive so access to the installation CD is out of the question. You will have to create your own disk installation image.

Do you have a Windows 98 SE boot disk? If so, take the drive out of the laptop and mount it into a different computer. You can use the USB to IDE/SATA adapter for this purpose. You will have to delete the partitions on your laptop hard drive and create two new partitions. The Primary partition will be ALL EXCEPT 420MB of the total disk space. DO NOT FORMAT or assign a drive letter. The Secondary partition will be for the remaining 420MB. Format the secondary partition to FAT32 and assign it drive letter D: (or E:, etc.). Copy the I386 folder from your installation CD to the FAT32 partition.

Place the drive back into the laptop and boot to the Windows 98 floppy disk. If you have SMARTDRV.EXE on the boot floppy, then type SMARTDRV and hit enter at the DOS Prompt. Then go to the drive letter for the FAT32 partition. Type CD\I386 and hit Enter. Type WINNT and hit Enter. The installation for Windows XP should now start.