Trouble installing windows XP

[Tayls]

I'm in the process of fixing a computer for a friend. She bought it for 10 bucks from her college that was throwing away old computers to make room for new ones. the only catch is that it still had windows installed in a way that u must loggin to the school network with ur student id blah blah blah.

Obviously that doesn't do you much good so the first step would be to wipe the HDD and install a fresh copy of windows!.... right?

the Problem is:
It won't boot from its CDROM drive even tho it has the option in the bios to boot from CD.

Sooooo, can u guys give me some suggestions that don't involve burning it, throwing it, or smashing it?

I have already tried removing the HDD and using another PC to install windows and popping it back into the original PC...(Doesn't work so well with WinXP ProSP2)

edit:
what i know about the PC:
P3 1GHz proc
512 pc133 Ram
60Gig IDE HDD
GeForce mmx440 agp graphix card
3 1/4" floppy drive
Iomega IDE Zip Drive

edit2x:
Possible causes:
CD-Rom drive is bad
MOBO is bad
HDD is bad

[DarkCyntax]

you could try the six disk windows xp booting. Works tested! Had the same prob way back and later turned out my motherboard was fuuked up

6 disk win xp booty XD
http://www.bootdisk.com/bootdisk.htm

[Inferno.]

1. Get a spare DVD/CD-ROM drive that you know reads discs. Place it in, see if you can format/boot from the Windows CD.

2. If you still get no joy put the hard drive from that PC into another PC and try formatting/installing Windows onto it.

3. Buy/get a spare hard drive, format/install it with Windows. Try to boot it on that PC.

4. Get a USB version of Windows, bootable. Load it up and access the contents of the hard disk?

[Huey Kruthas]

I would say there is a very good chance the CD drive is screwed, if it is a school computer. Kids tend to play rough with computers that aren't their own when they are bored.

[Panda Man]

Open it up and make sure the IDE ribbon is connected and firmly in place. Make sure the CD-ROM is being detected

Also, winxp should work just fine on this rig

[Ultimate X]

theres a program called wipe drive if you can get your hands on it itll bypass windows settings and delete everying on the drive as if straight out of assembly. use that then instal windows.

[Evans]

Did you check to make sure the install CD works in another computer?

[Cosmic]

Hmm, it's unlikely that a school would allow students to boot computers via the CD drive, that's just asking for trouble. There's probably some additional restriction in the BIOS settings that needs to be turned off.

[Inferno.]

Hmm, it's unlikely that a school would allow students to boot computers via the CD drive, that's just asking for trouble. There's probably some additional restriction in the BIOS settings that needs to be turned off.

Maybe he could restore the optimal defaults, or factory defaults, or something like that?

[Cosmic]

He could try but if it's anything like my old school's computers there will be a password in place. Can't say for sure without more information from the OP..

[Inferno.]

He could try but if it's anything like my old school's computers there will be a password in place. Can't say for sure without more information from the OP..

Reset the CMOS by moving/removing the CMOS jumper?

I forgot about the password, my school's PCs have passwords in the BIOS, too.

[Cosmic]

That's probably his best bet. I mean, it could be anything, but given that we're talking about a school computer the most likely scenario is a restricted BIOS.

[Tayls]

I knew from the getgo that the BIOS would be passworded so even before messing with windows i reset the CMOS and set it up accordingly.

I've checked all the connections(internal and external).
Have checked my WinXP disc (its good)
I've already wiped the drive via my own PC and even tried to use my own PC to load windows to it and put the HDD back into the other computer.
I don't have a floppy drive to setup the winxp 6 disk boot method
I don't have a spare usb drive(PC doesn't support boot from USB anyway)
and I knew from the beginning that this machine could run windows XP as it was already on it to begin with.(just couldn't do anything because of lack of admin powers)

So it seems that the only viable options are to:
1.) Replace CDrom drive (i have a spare i can use for this)
and if that doesn't work
2.) Replace the MOBO (which wouldn't be worth it)
and ofcourse my preferance
3.) Tell her the PC is fried an not worth repairing and just keep the HDD and put it into my computer (we could all use the extra disk space - 60GIG)

[Inferno.]

I knew from the getgo that the BIOS would be passworded so even before messing with windows i reset the CMOS and set it up accordingly.

I've checked all the connections(internal and external).
Have checked my WinXP disc (its good)
I've already wiped the drive via my own PC and even tried to use my own PC to load windows to it and put the HDD back into the other computer.
I don't have a floppy drive to setup the winxp 6 disk boot method
I don't have a spare usb drive(PC doesn't support boot from USB anyway)
and I knew from the beginning that this machine could run windows XP as it was already on it to begin with.(just couldn't do anything because of lack of admin powers)

So it seems that the only viable options are to:
1.) Replace CDrom drive (i have a spare i can use for this)
and if that doesn't work
2.) Replace the MOBO (which wouldn't be worth it)
and ofcourse my preferance
3.) Tell her the PC is fried an not worth repairing and just keep the HDD and put it into my computer (we could all use the extra disk space - 60GIG)

You know you want to go with option 3.

but yeah that is about the options you have, try 1, if not, 3. ;]

[Tayls]

You know you want to go with option 3.

but yeah that is about the options you have, try 1, if not, 3. ;]

I'll try option 1 first
but pray that it doesn't work!