I am installing a new 120 GB Hard Drive in my Pressario 1500 laptop. Rather
than finding the restore disk and reload the system with all the old drivers
I decided to buy a new OEM WinXP SP3 disk ($99).

I can't clone from my original HD as it is corrupted.

My question is: Do I need to do a HD preparation first or is it just a
matter of inserting the disk and setting up the laptop to boot off the DVD.
My first attempt did not go well and I got a currupt file message. I
exchanged the WinXP disk and am about to start again. The disk packaging
mentioned some about installing a OEM Preparation kit first.

Any help appreciated.

On Sun, 23 Aug 2009 15:07:35 -0700, "ghelf"
<ghelf@sbcglobalDeathToSpam.net> wrote:

>I am installing a new 120 GB Hard Drive in my Pressario 1500 laptop. Rather
>than finding the restore disk and reload the system with all the old drivers
>I decided to buy a new OEM WinXP SP3 disk ($99).
>
>I can't clone from my original HD as it is corrupted.
>
>My question is: Do I need to do a HD preparation first or is it just a
>matter of inserting the disk and setting up the laptop to boot off the DVD.
>My first attempt did not go well and I got a currupt file message. I
>exchanged the WinXP disk and am about to start again. The disk packaging
>mentioned some about installing a OEM Preparation kit first.
>
>Any help appreciated.

Well, not much help from here, but I do have one comment.... you
really should find that restore CD with the drivers. That OEM copy of
Win XP very likely won't have the drivers you'll need with that
laptop, which means you'll spend (probably) more time looking for the
drivers on the web than you'd spend looking for the restore CD.

but good luck anyway.

You should be able to just boot from the XP CD. If you can't something
is wrong.

OEM CDs are intended for "system builders" and for them, there is an OEM
preinstallation kit (OPK) that allows them to customize the
installation. That is how drivers and mgrs logo in system properties
and other software ("crapware") gets included in OEM CDs. But that
process is not applicable to you, it is not necessary, and it is
amazingly complex. Not to mention that you didn't even get the OPK CD
(the OPK CD comes with multi-unit "packs" (e.g., for example, 10-packs)
of OEM CDs.

If you got a corrupt file message, do not discount the possibility that
your optical drive is marginal. It's quite common in laptops.

There is nothing really wrong with what you have done, but I sure would
not have spent $100 when, with the original restore CD, you could have
gotten to the same place via a different route.


ghelf wrote:
> I am installing a new 120 GB Hard Drive in my Pressario 1500 laptop.
> Rather
> than finding the restore disk and reload the system with all the old
> drivers
> I decided to buy a new OEM WinXP SP3 disk ($99).
>
> I can't clone from my original HD as it is corrupted.
>
> My question is: Do I need to do a HD preparation first or is it just a
> matter of inserting the disk and setting up the laptop to boot off the DVD.
> My first attempt did not go well and I got a currupt file message. I
> exchanged the WinXP disk and am about to start again. The disk packaging
> mentioned some about installing a OEM Preparation kit first.
>
> Any help appreciated.
>

Thanks for your help. I don't think I really understand the Product Key
thing but I believe you are right my DVD may be marginal.
I't over 5 years old and I would not be surprised if some dust had found its
way onto the DVD lens. Both the original restore disk & my new OEM WinXp
disk will work for a while than stall with a message some folder on the DVD
could not be read.
I'm not too upset my original restore disk did not work because I didn't
want all the original crapware installed. The original programs would be 5
years old as well as the drivers. I decided to just byte the bullet and have
"Frys Electronics" do the install for $99.
Thanks for your help.

Take a Q-tip, put some windex on the tip, wipe it VERY gently across the
lens. Note that the lens is not fixed but is in a "voice coil" for
focus and tracking. So you need to be, again, VERY gentle in touching
it (with anything .....). This may or may not help but should not to
any harm if you are gentle.

You spent $100 on the copy of Windows and $100 more on having them do
the install. That may equal the total value of an older laptop.



ghelf wrote:
> Thanks for your help. I don't think I really understand the Product Key
> thing but I believe you are right my DVD may be marginal.
> I't over 5 years old and I would not be surprised if some dust had found
> its way onto the DVD lens. Both the original restore disk & my new OEM
> WinXp disk will work for a while than stall with a message some folder
> on the DVD could not be read.
> I'm not too upset my original restore disk did not work because I didn't
> want all the original crapware installed. The original programs would be
> 5 years old as well as the drivers. I decided to just byte the bullet
> and have "Frys Electronics" do the install for $99.
> Thanks for your help.

Yes, I thought about the economics of the install but I'm hoping to pump the
technician for information about what went wrong with the install. I'm
suppose to pick up the unit today. The knowledge is worth something to me. I
have two daughter and I have a feeling I'll be doing this again with some
other computer. I'll also share with the group what I learned.
Thanks.

"Barry Watzman" <WatzmanNOSPAM@neo.rr.com> wrote in message
news:h758f1$hi9$1@news.eternal-september.org...
> Take a Q-tip, put some windex on the tip, wipe it VERY gently across the
> lens. Note that the lens is not fixed but is in a "voice coil" for focus
> and tracking. So you need to be, again, VERY gentle in touching it (with
> anything .....). This may or may not help but should not to any harm if
> you are gentle.
>
> You spent $100 on the copy of Windows and $100 more on having them do the
> install. That may equal the total value of an older laptop.
>
>
>
> ghelf wrote:
>> Thanks for your help. I don't think I really understand the Product Key
>> thing but I believe you are right my DVD may be marginal.
>> I't over 5 years old and I would not be surprised if some dust had found
>> its way onto the DVD lens. Both the original restore disk & my new OEM
>> WinXp disk will work for a while than stall with a message some folder on
>> the DVD could not be read.
>> I'm not too upset my original restore disk did not work because I didn't
>> want all the original crapware installed. The original programs would be
>> 5 years old as well as the drivers. I decided to just byte the bullet and
>> have "Frys Electronics" do the install for $99.
>> Thanks for your help.

Barry Watzman wrote:
> You should be able to just boot from the XP CD. If you can't something
> is wrong.
>
> OEM CDs are intended for "system builders" and for them, there is an OEM
> preinstallation kit (OPK) that allows them to customize the
> installation. That is how drivers and mgrs logo in system properties
> and other software ("crapware") gets included in OEM CDs. But that
> process is not applicable to you, it is not necessary, and it is
> amazingly complex. Not to mention that you didn't even get the OPK CD
> (the OPK CD comes with multi-unit "packs" (e.g., for example, 10-packs)
> of OEM CDs.
>
> If you got a corrupt file message, do not discount the possibility that
> your optical drive is marginal. It's quite common in laptops.
Second that.
I have one laptop that will happily copy the entire cd to the HD,
but gives errors when trying to install from the same cd.

As I recall...I had to partition the hard drive into two pieces,
format fat32
and copy the Cd to the second partition. Then boot from a win98
boot disk and install from the hard drive. winnt32, I think, is the
file you execute. Then change the partitions from fat32 to ntfs.
Maybe, if you boot from a ME boot disk, you can skip the fat32 part...
not sure.
>
> There is nothing really wrong with what you have done, but I sure would
> not have spent $100 when, with the original restore CD, you could have
> gotten to the same place via a different route.
>
>
> ghelf wrote:
>> I am installing a new 120 GB Hard Drive in my Pressario 1500 laptop.
>> Rather
>> than finding the restore disk and reload the system with all the old
>> drivers
>> I decided to buy a new OEM WinXP SP3 disk ($99).
>>
>> I can't clone from my original HD as it is corrupted.
>>
>> My question is: Do I need to do a HD preparation first or is it just a
>> matter of inserting the disk and setting up the laptop to boot off the
>> DVD.
>> My first attempt did not go well and I got a currupt file message. I
>> exchanged the WinXP disk and am about to start again. The disk packaging
>> mentioned some about installing a OEM Preparation kit first.
>>
>> Any help appreciated.
>>

"Knowledge" gained from a Best Buy technician is almost alway of
extremely marginal value. In most cases, at best, they know how to do
certain things, but very few of them really understand what they are
doing and they give out a LOT of (in fact mostly) false and mis-information.


ghelf wrote:
> Yes, I thought about the economics of the install but I'm hoping to pump
> the technician for information about what went wrong with the install.
> I'm suppose to pick up the unit today. The knowledge is worth something
> to me. I have two daughter and I have a feeling I'll be doing this again
> with some other computer. I'll also share with the group what I learned.
> Thanks.
>
> "Barry Watzman" <WatzmanNOSPAM@neo.rr.com> wrote in message
> news:h758f1$hi9$1@news.eternal-september.org...
>> Take a Q-tip, put some windex on the tip, wipe it VERY gently across
>> the lens. Note that the lens is not fixed but is in a "voice coil"
>> for focus and tracking. So you need to be, again, VERY gentle in
>> touching it (with anything .....). This may or may not help but
>> should not to any harm if you are gentle.
>>
>> You spent $100 on the copy of Windows and $100 more on having them do
>> the install. That may equal the total value of an older laptop.
>>
>>
>>
>> ghelf wrote:
>>> Thanks for your help. I don't think I really understand the Product
>>> Key thing but I believe you are right my DVD may be marginal.
>>> I't over 5 years old and I would not be surprised if some dust had
>>> found its way onto the DVD lens. Both the original restore disk & my
>>> new OEM WinXp disk will work for a while than stall with a message
>>> some folder on the DVD could not be read.
>>> I'm not too upset my original restore disk did not work because I
>>> didn't want all the original crapware installed. The original
>>> programs would be 5 years old as well as the drivers. I decided to
>>> just byte the bullet and have "Frys Electronics" do the install for $99.
>>> Thanks for your help.
>

ME does not support NTFS either. That is the problem with using a
Windows 98 boot floppy to get an installation started as you have
described. Unfortunately, when you later convert the FAT32 partition to
NTFS, you get a poorly configured partition with an inefficient cluster
size and some of the critical data structures on the partition may be
fragmented. For this reason, it's better to start off with NTFS from
the "get go" than to start with FAT32 and convert. But that's a problem
because Windows 98 doesn't support NTFS. Today, this problem can be
circumvented by using a variant of XP or Vista that is booted entirely
from optical media (Ultimate Boot CD, or the Vista recovery environment).

To start the installation from an installation CD (or it's contents
copied to a hard drive), use:

WINNT.EXE to run a "DOS" setup program
WINNT32.EXE to run a "Windows" setup program

All of the installation files (including both WINNT.EXE and WINNT32.EXE)
are found in the "I386" folder. However, some OEM CDs supplied by
computer manufacturers as "restore media" may not include either or both
of those files.


spamme0 wrote:
> Barry Watzman wrote:
>> You should be able to just boot from the XP CD. If you can't
>> something is wrong.
>>
>> OEM CDs are intended for "system builders" and for them, there is an
>> OEM preinstallation kit (OPK) that allows them to customize the
>> installation. That is how drivers and mgrs logo in system properties
>> and other software ("crapware") gets included in OEM CDs. But that
>> process is not applicable to you, it is not necessary, and it is
>> amazingly complex. Not to mention that you didn't even get the OPK CD
>> (the OPK CD comes with multi-unit "packs" (e.g., for example,
>> 10-packs) of OEM CDs.
>>
>> If you got a corrupt file message, do not discount the possibility
>> that your optical drive is marginal. It's quite common in laptops.
>
> Second that.
> I have one laptop that will happily copy the entire cd to the HD,
> but gives errors when trying to install from the same cd.
>
> As I recall...I had to partition the hard drive into two pieces,
> format fat32
> and copy the Cd to the second partition. Then boot from a win98
> boot disk and install from the hard drive. winnt32, I think, is the
> file you execute. Then change the partitions from fat32 to ntfs.
> Maybe, if you boot from a ME boot disk, you can skip the fat32 part...
> not sure.
>