Rescuing a notebook

[tomwalshco]

Had a notebook crash whose CD drive does not work.

Through a a bunch of swapping and manuevering I have managed to load an entire XP Pro install CD to the HDD of this notebook.

Using boot disks have gotten to DOS prompt and can see the C: drive where the XP CD files reside. When I do a C:\>dir command can see the SETUP.EXE file and try to run it, but when I do a C:\>setup.exe execute, I get a "The command is not recognized" error. My DOS is a little rusty, but I think this command should start the XP install process.

Anyone want to tackle this? Thanks.

[Play_The_0dds]

i have started a xp install from a drive as you describe with a 98 bootdisk.
instead of trying to run the setup exe do this.
boot from floppy or however you boot to the A: prompt then type this
A:\C:
hit enter
now you have the C:\ prompt type
C:\i386\winnt32

if the copy of xp is on a different partition you will have to use your drive letter if not C: and also if you have it in a folder you will have to add it to the command.

[tomwalshco]

I have run the boot disks and can get to the DOS prompt and can see the files, but they won't run for some reason. Errors I get are:

C:\cd i386 - "access is denied"
C:\i386\winnt32 - " The command is not recognized"