Os switch

[Guest]

i ahve a laptop with vista. for some reason it doesnt show my internal dvdrom anymore. i have an external dvdrom with and xp disc. i want to do a fresh install of windows xp. how do i do this with the external dvdrom? i tried going into the bios to switch to usb but it still doesnt work. it boots up normalinto vista. can someone help?

 

[ramblegamble]

is the internal drive broken? or did it just stop working recently? If the Rom does not boot during POST and you've got everything setup correctly then yea, it might be dead.

As for the external drive...I'd say it depends on the laptop. I have an averatec laptop and i can't boot from any USB port on it. there's not the option in my bios. Could be the same for you. Check your bios and see if you can boot "removable device"

 

[Translucency]

Look for an option in the BIOS called boot sequence or boot order. It should list your device, else try to select CDROM first and try if it boots from your external optical drive.