That considered, I'll have to either install XP or 7 Home... How difficult will this be? I don't imagine it being too difficult or time consuming to get the files prepared and put onto a USB flash drive to install onto netbook after partitioning drive and all that but my main concern is other things such as drivers for components and the like.
Are there certain drivers and other pre-installed software that I'll need to reinstall after the change of OS and if so, how will I go about getting those needed drivers and other wares? Obviously I'm not concerned about the junk that will be preloaded on the book but it's the crucial things. (Last time I fully reinstalled XP on my main laptop due to a virus I was unprepared and it took forever to get all the drivers replaces). Any thoughts?Installing New OS on Netbook?
What you'll need:
USB_PREP8 http://www.2shared.com/file/2581432/a65c
PeToUSB http://www.2shared.com/file/2581436/a131
Bootsect.exe http://www.2shared.com/file/2585881/5ad9
Special Note: If you use the program Nlite be sure to keep the manual installation files as the USB_prep8 script relies on these files.
Extract the files in Bootsect.zip
The next step is to extract USB_prep8 and PeToUSB.
Next copy the PeToUSB executable into the USB_prep8 folder.
Inside of the USB_prep8 folder double click the executable named usb_prep8.cmd.
Press any key to continue
These settings are preconfigured for you all you need to do now is click start.
Once the format is complete DO NOT close the window just leave everything as it is and open a command prompt from your start menu (type cmd in the search bar or run box depending on your version of windows.).
Inside of the command windows go to the directory you have bootsect.exe saved.
(use the cd directoryname command to switch folders)
Now type ';bootsect.exe /nt52 R:'; NOTE R: is the drive letter for my USB stick if yours is different you need to change it accordingly. What this part does is write the correct boot sector to your USB stick, this allows your PC to boot from the USB stick without it nothing works.
Please note: When running the bootsect.exe command you cannot have any windows open displaying the content of your USB stick, if you have a window open bootsect.exe will be unable to lock the drive and write the bootsector correctly.
If all went well you should see ';Bootcode was successfully updated on all targeted volumes.';
Now you can close this command prompt (don't close the usbprep8 one by mistake) and the petousb window.
You window you see now should look like this:
If it doesn't try pressing enter.
Now you need to enter the correct information for numbers 1-3.
Press 1 and then enter. A folder browse window will open for you to browse to the location of you XP setup files (aka your cdrom drive with xp cd in)
Press 2 and enter a letter not currently assigned to a drive on your PC
Press 3 and enter the drive letter of your USB stick
Press 4 to start the process.
The script will ask you if its ok to format drive T:. This is just a temp drive the program creates to cache the windows installation files. Press Y then enter.
Once it's done formating press enter to continue again, you can now see the program copying files to the temp drive it created. Once this is done press enter to continue again.
Next you will see a box pop up asking you to copy the files to USB drive yes/no you want to click yes.
Once the script has completed copy files a popup window asking if you would like to USB drive to be preferred boot drive U: select YES on this window.
Now select yes to unmount the virtual drive.
Ok we are done the hard part, close the usbprep8 window.
Now make sure your PC is configured with USB as the primary boot device.
Insert your USB drive and boot up the PC.
On the startup menu you have two options, select option number 2 for text mode setup.
From this point on it is just like any other windows XP installation delete/recreate the primary partition on your PC and format it using NTFS. Make sure you delete ALL partitions and recreate a single partition or you will get the hal.dll error message.
Once the text mode portion of setup is complete it will boot into the GUI mode (you can press enter after the reboot if your too excited to wait the 30 seconds)
Once the GUI portion of setup is complete you will again have to boot into GUI mode this will complete the XP installation and you will end up at you XP desktop. It is very important that you DO NOT REMOVE THE USB STICK before this point. Once you can see your start menu it is safe to remove the usb stick and reboot your PC to make sure everything worked.
This method has advantages over all current no cdrom methods of installing XP to a PC. You do not have to copy setup files in DOS to the SSD and install from there. It gives you access to the recovery console by booting into text mode setup, and it gives you the ability to run repair installations of XP if you have problems later on.Installing New OS on Netbook?
Save your self the trouble and spend a little extra on a external Dvd drive
Look, downgrading is sometimes not a good thing. Depending on how NEW this laptops hardware is, you may be stuck trying to find drivers to work with it on winxp. Winxp is really outdated now and I do not recommend it. I would upgrade to home or vista mabey. Either way, upgrading and downgrading is very easy. Usually if you have cd just follow instructions and you should be on your way. Then download available drivers from acer. Another issue is activation for xp. If you have used an older cd and trying to put that on new acer microsoft will ask you key questions and if you answer wrong they will not activate windows. 30 days then its gone........ Dont downgrade.
No comments:
Post a Comment