I put this here because.. (Problems with PC Hard Drive)

[Craigtimms]

Its about a p.c! agh!

Just a question.. as ive recieved the most awesome help in my short time here..

I was 'evaluating' the idea of turning my hp pavilion zv6000 laptop (1.5gb ram, 1.8ghz amd, 40gb ide hdd, ati mobile graphics) into a hackintosh

which turned out not to work (my macs will not be tainted!)

But i had vista on it anyway which needed to go.. i tried to reinstall XP but it wouldnt let me boot from the cd..

However i COULD boot the hackintosh cd with vista being installed

getting more infuriated with the sodding windoze situation and lacking hardware support from the hackintosh (which no one should do..!)

I decided to dump the laptop HD into a external enclosure and nuke it to get rid of the virus.. er.. sorry i mean get rid of vista.

Now.. i formatted it as fat32, but alas my laptop still wont boot from my original hp xp sp2 recovery dvd.. it just does bugger all.

(still boots into the darwin thing for the mac image)

my xp cd works on other computers.. infact just the other day i installed windows via boot camp on my imac - the cd isnt damaged one bit



any clues?
Did completely reformatting the hdd stop me installing anything (ive never done a complete fresh install like so before)

Can anyone help? Or should i be shunned for all eternity for trying a hackintosh and then asking for help with a windoze installation?!

(am downloading a few linux distro's as we speak)

cheers!

 

[TuffLuffJimmy]

stop bumping yourself.

what is the drive formatted to? I don't think it's supposed to be fat32, I would try NTFS

 

[Craigtimms]

appologies for the bumptastic behaviour im waiting on other forums too!
That would explain why the mac cd would boot but not..

im thinking of installing ubuntu on it fresh, no other os as of how.. i dont know yet got some googling to do

but i would like to be safe in the knowledge that i can put xp on it.

I'll try ntfs.. it makes good sence. thank **** i installed xp on my mac!

 

[ebel3003]

Try resetting the BIOS using the button on the motherboard. Afterwards, try booting the the recovery cd.

 

[flyfish29]

Next time you will get a better response from titling your thread more specifically...I put this here because... doesn't always make people who CAN help open the thread.

sorry, but I can't help...with the thread at least. My advice woudl be to use it as a canoe anchor! Just my opinion of any Windows machine.

 

[just4funuk]

First thing to check is that the Computer bios has the CDrom set as the first boot device.If this is already set then you could try suggestions below.

If you have formated the drive on another PC and are still finding the machine trying to boot into OSX.It maybe that you have setup two partitions on the harddrive.Windows will not display the MAC partition in My computer .As windows cannot read MAC partitions without software installed.If the laptop has a floppy drive try booting with a windows boot disk with fdisk on it.Fdisk can be used to remove/list all partitions on the drive.

If you cannot get hold of a Boot disk with fdisk.Reconnect the drive to a PC.Go into disk manager(right click my computer select manage then select disk management) and you should see all your drives displayed.The external drive could be one with possibly two partitions or more.Select that drive and delete the partitions on it.Make sure this is the correct drive as the data will be permentley deleted.Then you can either create a partition to the full size of the drive or create one to the size you want.

 

[Craigtimms]

appreciating the help,


Just to tie a few loose ends: I only have my imac to do stuff with.. i completely formatted the laptop's hdd, there is no operating system on it, its totally fresh (the mac osx couldnt install)

I reformatted the laptop's hdd in an external harddrive enclosure using my imac, formatted it to fat32

Back in the laptop after reformat:

It wont boot the windows xp cd (which i know works)
It will boot an unbuntu install cd (which later fails to install.. downloading a different version)
It will boot from the mac osx (hackintosh) cd but wont install as it hangs on waiting for root device (incompatable hardware i believe)


I dont really want windows on my laptop again.. ever! so im going down the linux root, im trying a different distro atm.

In the mean time - i think - booting into windows on my imac and reformatting the laptops HDD (via external usb enclosure) to ntfs may solve the problem (as mentioned above)

Anyone know if unbuntu will install to ntfs? - googling that now

cheers!

 

[ebel3003]

appreciating the help,


Just to tie a few loose ends: I only have my imac to do stuff with.. i completely formatted the laptop's hdd, there is no operating system on it, its totally fresh (the mac osx couldnt install)

I reformatted the laptop's hdd in an external harddrive enclosure using my imac, formatted it to fat32

Back in the laptop after reformat:

It wont boot the windows xp cd (which i know works)
It will boot an unbuntu install cd (which later fails to install.. downloading a different version)
It will boot from the mac osx (hackintosh) cd but wont install as it hangs on waiting for root device (incompatable hardware i believe)


I dont really want windows on my laptop again.. ever! so im going down the linux root, im trying a different distro atm.

In the mean time - i think - booting into windows on my imac and reformatting the laptops HDD (via external usb enclosure) to ntfs may solve the problem (as mentioned above)

Anyone know if unbuntu will install to ntfs? - googling that now

cheers!

Linux will not install to NTFS. It will end up formatting it as Ext3, most likely.

 

[Craigtimms]

cheers guys i tried to battle on with my linux distro's tried 3 different versions of unbuntu on the fat32 formatted harddrive, only the latest version would boot from the cd.. but would get errors and not install..

i gave in and reformatted the HDD via my mac on windows to ntfs

after about 5 or 6 reboots it finally decided to boot from cd.. i have no idea why its playing up??

Perhaps theres a more sinister problem here than i thought.. Xp is currently installing (sigh)

I will try to get unbuntu after ive installed windoze.. which i hear is the more reliable route?

Cheers for the help alot guys