[kingtaz]

I have an external hard drive that is IDE. my other pc ( the one im using just now) is SATA. I bought IDE to SATA converters so i could use this external HDD on my current pc but none of them worked. So, I inserted the External HDD into old pc (my original IDE HDD for this machine died), booted it up using ERD Commander, burned files i wanted to keep and then used the shredder option to delete the remainder of the HDD. I plan to install XP onto this hard drive and use my old Pc again but when I insert the xp disk and boot up the machine, i get the message 'press any key to boot from CD......Missing operating system' after i press any key. BIOS have been set to boot from disk so can anyone tell me what the problem is here? what do i need to do to install xp on this HDD?

Many thanks in advance

kingtaz

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Welcome

The fact that you are getting the (press any key to boot from CD) is indicating that the bios sees that you want to boot from cd.
The bios may not be detecting the cd drive, you have a bad XP cd, or the drive is bad.

Unplug your power and then reseat the power and ribbon cable to the drive.
If you are using 1 cable, the hard drive should be on the end.

[123Runner]

Welcome

The fact that you are getting the (press any key to boot from CD) is indicating that the bios sees that you want to boot from cd.
The bios may not be detecting the cd drive, you have a bad XP cd, or the drive is bad.

Unplug your power and then reseat the power and ribbon cable to the drive.
If you are using 1 cable, the hard drive should be on the end.

[kingtaz]

Hi 123 Runner,

thanks for your response.

The HDD is recognised in the bios as it detects it and it's 320gb capacity when i press 'detect drives'. The hard drive is on the end of the power cable. What does the 'missing operating system' mean though? To me, it's obvious there is no operating system as there is nothing on the HDD but that is what im trying to install onto it so what is causing ths message to appear?

Many thanks

kingtaz

[123Runner]

The bios may not be detecting the cd drive, you have a bad XP cd, or the drive is bad.

The bootup is bypassing the cd drive. We need to figure out why.
Please check what I asked.

[kingtaz]

which drive do you mean? i have a dvd writer and a cd writer installed. I checked there and the HDD has a ribbon cable attached and it is on the end

[kingtaz]

To update, I managed to use ERD to format the HDD and it was successful. When i now try to boot from the XP cd i get the message 'NTLDR is missing Press CTRL+Alt+Del to restart'. Anyone know what could be going on here? I assumed once i had formatted thr HDD that the XP cd would run smoothly and i would be able to install XP on my pc easily

Thanks in advance

kingtaz

[123Runner]

A pre-format of the HD is not necessary. When you boot off the XP cd, you will get the option to format the drive. It is part of the procedure.

[kingtaz]

when i boot off the xp cd, all i get is 'press any key to boot from cd' then it does not load. the xp cd is fine as ive tried it on my other oc and it works fine. the cd drives on my oc are also fine as erd commander loads up with no problems. What does ntldr mean though? thid HDD was an external HD but im now trying to use it internally after the usb port on it got damaged. is this having any affect do you think? all i want here is to install xp onto this HD so i can have another pc for the household to use. would i be better just buying a cheap 40gb one for £15-20?