[Ubuntu Chicago] Cannot install XP (yeah yeah, I know)

[Patrick Green]

None of those fancy floppy drives the laptop.  Okay...so...let's assume we
do not have this funky driver issue you are speaking of (I have not actively
used windows since 1997 so I know less about windows than any other OS out
there-hell, I know SAP better than I know Windows), would the best route be
1. Burning a DOS boot cd
2.  Supporting free software and downloading a copy of Freedos and doing the
format c: mbr
3.  Find a windows 98 bootable image for a cd (is there such a critter)

Should the above fail, then how do I execute this nliteos plan to circumvent
this whole mess?

Stupid Sony Hardware.  Had he not has so many issues with the hardware he
would have been happy and I would not have to install crap on this piece of
crap.

On Dec 10, 2007 4:49 PM, Brian Green <greenbrian at gmail.com> wrote:

>
>
> > |
> > | On Dec 10, 2007 4:06 PM, Patrick Green < patlgreen at gmail.com> wrote:
> > | > Okay...I know.  Here is the story.  One student at CLC tool the
> > Linux
> > | > challenge since he does not like Vista.  So I removed Vista and
> > Installed
> > | > Gutsy.  Well, he is not a big fan of that either.  So he goes to Wal
> > Mart
> > | > and buys a copy of XP Pro.  Every time he tries to install it on his
> > Sony
> > | > Laptop it tells him the hard drive cannot be found.  So I take it
> > home
> > | > with me and I run gparted to delete the partitions.  I get the same
> > | > error. Okay...fine...run gparted again and partition as a
> > FAT32....still
> > | > no joy. So I go into the R option of XP for repair and enter fixmbr.
> >  And
> > | > still....nothing.   Now, I know BIOS recoignizes the hard drive and
> > I can
> > | > get into it all day long with gparted or..welll...any live CD.  What
> > am I
> > | > missing here?
> > | >
> > | > End of the day I wish he liked the Ubuntu, but this is what he wants
> > and
> > | > I am trying to help facilitate it...ideas?  BTW, Sony VAIO with Duo
> > | > Centrino 4GB RAM...PCG-384L is the Sony model number.
> >
> > If he has one of those things that take that 2.5" disk, I think it is
> > called a
> > floppy drive :p  You can boot a win98 boot disk, and then format the
> > mbr.
> > Another thing could be that his drive is part of a funky sata/ide card
> > that
> > isn't recognized by XP w/o pressing F6 and installing the device drivers
> > for
> > it before you try to install XP.
> >
>
> I had this thought too.  Just as an aside, I've used the free app nlite  (
> http://www.nliteos.com ) to slipstream such drivers when I encountered
> that situation and the machine didn't have a floppy drive.  Nifty app, can
> do much more as well.
>
> Brian Green
>
>
> --
> Ubuntu-us-chicago mailing list
> Ubuntu-us-chicago at lists.ubuntu.com
> https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-us-chicago
>
>
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