Archived from groups: microsoft.public.win2000.setup_upgrade (
More info?)
(An aside
You could of course search for (or post regarding) each
problem you believe SP4 introduced. When SP4 was released, these NGs
were inundated with posts about resulting problems, but such are
relatively rare now and I believe most or all of the problems have been
resolved by subsequent update releases. (This is an aside.)
(An aside
CD drives are pretty cheap now (laptops not so.)
1. Assuming C: is the system-residence directory, move the \i386 to D:.
ALSO make sure you have necessary W2k-specific drivers on D:, and any
library of SPs and updates you'll want to reinstall. A clean W2k
install will obliterate the current C:, which will be deleted and become
"free space".
2. Acquire a W98 boot floppy from www.bootdisk.com, if you do not
already have a known-good bootable DOS floppy at hand. Acquire the
NTFSDOS driver from www.sysinternals.com and put it on that floppy. Now
the DOS boot floppy's DOS will be able to manipulate NTFS formatted
structures.
- with that floppy at hand, and the \i386 material on D:, you won't get
into any permanent crippling situation. Barring major error.
3. From within the "problematic" W2k SP4 system, if you can, launch:
D:\i386\winnt32.exe (with the parameters you want, if any)
As you know, this will start the W2k installer. I think (but am not
absolutely positive) it will proceed normally through the entire install
process. You might as well try this; it's the simplest thing, and you're
safe if it doesn't work.
If it doesn't work, your fallback is booting from that floppy and
launching the installer from the command line. You may have to use the
16-bit installer:
D:\i386\winnt.exe (parameters as above)
4. When the installer offers you options about deleting/creating/
formatting existing partitions, DELETE C:. Then when that's done,
IMMEDIATELY ABORT that install. Just power off.
5. Now reboot to that floppy and restart the installer. This
abort/restart step prevents any chance of unexpected drive letter
assignments.
6. Proceed to install W2k into that available free space. The newly
created W2k partition will be a new C:. The install should proceed
normally; the installer will ask you early on to tell it where the
install files are, or to confirm that D:\i386 is correct. It is. (Check
that at this stage of the process, which is intermediate, D: is really
D: and not temporarily C: or E: etc. It should still be D: unless I'm
missing something.)
It would be great if you'd post back in this thread with results. If you
get into a snarl, there are other ways of getting this done, but none
simpler that I know of. If the machine is a desktop, for example, it's
very simple to substitute a borrowed CD drive for the duration of the
install process. Just takes a screwdriver. Electric-train-type
"engineering" savvy required; case cover off, disconnect 1 power and 1
data cable from old drive, unscrew 4 screws from drive & remove it,
insert & screw in new drive, reconnect cables, go.
Test that boot floppy once you've got it in hand, just to be sure all is
copacetic.
C Lee wrote:
> Hi
>
> Thanks for the response. In answer to your questions:
>
> 1. Yes, the internal CD is definitely broken, according
> to the manufacturers.
>
> 2. Hard Drive has two partitions, both of 10GB or so,
> both fairly empty, both NTFS. The Win2K CD image is on
> Drive C in a folder called I386. As far as I can tell it
> is a complete image.
>
> 3. The problems since the install of SP4 are those
> reported widely on the Internet by other people who
> installed SP4 (and yes, we should have done some research
> before installing...)
>
> You said that installing from the hard drive would be
> possible. Could you be a little more specific about what
> to do? Can I just run setup from within Windows, or will
> I need to do it from the floppy boot disks? If the
> latter, does Windows give me the option to choose from
> where to install? I'm concerned that if I start the
> process it will demand the CD-ROM in the drive and will
> not finish the install without it. Then my friend would
> be left with a partially-installed OS.
>
> Many thanks again
>
> C
>
>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>Post more info:
>>1. Is the internal CD drive hardware broken, for sure?
>
> Could it just be
>
>>a corrupted W2k driver problem or other software? (If
>
> uncertain, try a
>
>>DOS boot diskette with the necessary general-purpose CD
>
> software
>
>>included.) What clues can you find in Event Viewer &
>
> Device Manager?
>
>>2. What is the partitioning structure on the laptop's
>
> hard drive?
>
>>Where's the W2k CD image? Where's the owner's precious
>
> data? How are the
>
>>partitions formatted (FAT32/NTFS)? How full are the
>
> partitions?
>
>>3. What EXACTLY is/are the natures/symptoms of "all
>
> sorts of problems"?
>
>>You can install W2k from the hard drive, but that might
>
> be a destructive
>
>>fix and, depending on the above, might well be
>
> unnecessary.
>
>
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