Windows XP installation on a Dell laptop (confusing info )

philipyip said:

Are you trying to upgrade to a newer Operating System? If so there is a trick to install Windows 7 without a Product Key and input the Upgrade Product Key via the Command Prompt and activate via the command prompt which removes the need to reinstall Windows XP in order to upgrade to Windows 7. Also Windows 10 Version 1709 Installation Media accepts Windows 7 Upgrade Only Product Keys only.

If you are trying to get the original software on it you'll actually need 2 installation discs, firstly the Media Direct DVD and secondly the Windows XP Media Centre 2005 DVD.

You mentioned installation .isos where did you get these? I have actually both I think.

I started at user-guides.co.uk ( they advertised been able to supply the original OS disks ) and they have a few sister sites like NUMUS , DISQUS,and ZOFTAR zoftar was where I downloaded the software and that was a......... Driver Resource DVD Win XP .......a ....Data Recovery Boot Disk ...and Win XP MCE x86 SP3 en YES your right about the Media Direct DVD and the Windows XP Media Centre 2005 DVD I cant tell if it is Incorporated(media direct) within the installation DVD but I have noticed that when I made a USB bootable ISO file that if I look at the files the first one which is $OEMS$ does not contain any files at all saying they are missing or corrupt !!! So this would render the USB useless wouldn't it ?

philipyip said:

Are you trying to upgrade to a newer Operating System? If so there is a trick to install Windows 7 without a Product Key and input the Upgrade Product Key via the Command Prompt and activate via the command prompt which removes the need to reinstall Windows XP in order to upgrade to Windows 7. Also Windows 10 Version 1709 Installation Media accepts Windows 7 Upgrade Only Product Keys only.

If you are trying to get the original software on it you'll actually need 2 installation discs, firstly the Media Direct DVD and secondly the Windows XP Media Centre 2005 DVD.

You mentioned installation .isos where did you get these? I have actually both I think.

I am trying to install the original Software
I started at user-guides.co.uk ( they advertised been able to supply the original OS disks ) and they have a few sister sites like NUMUS , DISQUS,and ZOFTAR zoftar was where I downloaded the software and that was a......... Driver Resource DVD Win XP .......a ....Data Recovery Boot Disk ...and Win XP MCE x86 SP3 en YES your right about the Media Direct DVD and the Windows XP Media Centre 2005 DVD I cant tell if it is Incorporated(media direct) within the installation DVD but I have noticed that when I made a USB bootable ISO file that if I look at the files the first one which is $OEMS$ does not contain any files at all saying they are missing or corrupt !!! So this would render the USB useless wouldn't it ? I am pretty sure the installation software I downloaded will not work at all !!!!! I wasted my money!!

I have installed Win XP many times.
- $OEMS$, if i remember well, has specific software related to the computer manufacturer (Dell, HP, etc). Don't worry if it's empty.
- As I wrote, Win XP installation disk doesn't have SATA drivers, you will have to load the SATA drivers during installation (via a Floppy disk).
- The fist thing you must look for is the SATA drivers. As SATA is driven by the chipset, you must find out what chipset your laptop have and then search the net for the SATA drivers.
- If you have a floppy drive and disk, you can copy the SATA drivers to the floppy disk using a Linux on a USB flash drive.
- If you DON'T have a floppy drive or disk, you can use nlite to add those drivers to the Win XP installation disk.

If I were you I would forget Win XP and install a light Linux like Zorin, Mint or Lubuntu.

Megahertz07 said:

I have installed Win XP many times.
- $OEMS$, if i remember well, has specific software related to the computer manufacturer (Dell, HP, etc). Don't worry if it's empty.
- As I wrote, Win XP installation disk doesn't have SATA drivers, you will have to load the SATA drivers during installation (via a Floppy disk).
- The fist thing you must look for is the SATA drivers. As SATA is driven by the chipset, you must find out what chipset your laptop have and then search the net for the SATA drivers.
- If you have a floppy drive and disk, you can copy the SATA drivers to the floppy disk using a Linux on a USB flash drive.
- If you DON'T have a floppy drive or disk, you can use nlite to add those drivers to the Win XP installation disk.

If I were you I would forget Win XP and install a light Linux like Zorin, Mint or Lubuntu.

Yeah XP is a nightmare to install if I try and dont succeed then I will have to go for Linux in the end

Megahertz07 said:

I have installed Win XP many times.
- $OEMS$, if i remember well, has specific software related to the computer manufacturer (Dell, HP, etc). Don't worry if it's empty.
- As I wrote, Win XP installation disk doesn't have SATA drivers, you will have to load the SATA drivers during installation (via a Floppy disk).
- The fist thing you must look for is the SATA drivers. As SATA is driven by the chipset, you must find out what chipset your laptop have and then search the net for the SATA drivers.
- If you have a floppy drive and disk, you can copy the SATA drivers to the floppy disk using a Linux on a USB flash drive.
- If you DON'T have a floppy drive or disk, you can use nlite to add those drivers to the Win XP installation disk.

If I were you I would forget Win XP and install a light Linux like Zorin, Mint or Lubuntu.

System chip set = Mobile Intel 945 PM Express .... so I will hunt down the drivers for that ( no floppy drive ) but funny enough when I go to my computer it lists the DVD drive and any USB devices and also a floppy drive which I dont have ...lolol I went to the nlite site and will download it to install my SATA drivers . These are some of the error messages that have shown on the screen acpi.sys is corrupted ... No Boot Sector on Internal Hard Drive NO Bootable Devices and to insert the Automated System Recovery Disk into the Disk Drive ! I was also told to turn off the ACPI setting in the BIOS ... I only have a DIPM (device initiated power management) which is normally enabled as the default setting but I turned it OFF ... !!! or should it be set back to be ENABLED ? In the BIOS the hard drive is listed as 500GB HDD