i put a hard drive in the unit.
when you supply power it comes on, goes thru memory check and stops at insert system disk and push any key.no matter what you do thats all you can get it to do.can anyone help me get this thing to except an operating system?
bios recognizes the hard drive.
supplier said hard drive was formatted to a c prompt,and said that xray of postal parcels could have removed the prompt?

if you start with the startdisk in the cd rom,and turn on the machine it goes thru the memory test and goes to insert system disk then progresses no further.

i have visited the microsoft site to no avail.

thank you for any help...

Well, if the BIOS sees it, then the HDD is working..... And it's a laptop, so it's not as if it would be on the wrong IDE...... So it definitely sounds like there is no OS on the HDD, I guess....?

Now you said that "if you start with the startdisk in the cd rom,and turn on the machine it goes thru the memory test and goes to insert system disk then progresses no further" - I take it you mean the Windows installer CDROM? If so, then you need to ensure that you set your BOOT PRIORITY in the BIOS. It may currently be set to boot from (eg.) LEgacy Floppy, then Hard Drive, then CDROM. You need to have it boot from the CDROM (ATAPI device) first....

Hope that helps!

thank you,bios boot sequence has a HDD and floppy settings, no cd rom.so i have it set to boot to the floppy first then the HDD. Could it be that i need to use a floppy drive? all i have is the removable cd rom. set up with the boot sequence FLOPPY, then HDD,and the start disk installed,it goes no further than the "insert system disk"

The boot order has to have a setting for the CD drive. Try to change the order - it will become apparent then.

If the cd rom is external, connect it and then look in the boot order.

Windows is way too large to fit on floppies.

this unit is a toshiba satellite pro 420cdt. the unit has an internal cd rom that is removable cd rom drive.on the bios boot selection area the only 2 boot options are HDD and floppy. no cd rom is available for selection.i currently have it set to go to the floppy then the HDD for boot sequence,hoping that floppy selection would also be good for the cd. with a start-up cd in the drive i attempt to boot the unit up.at this point it goes thru the memory check and then goes to a screen that says insert system disk in drive,press any key when ready nothing you do will change the outcome of this sequence of occurrences.i have located and depressed the reset button which also has no effect on the outcome.anyone out there have anymore ideas?? i'll try whatever you suggest...thank you...

Never fear smoke and flames, we understand what you are saying. Lets look at the facts:

1. Your CD Drive is external and connects via USB.
2. You do not have the option to select the CDROM in the boot priority.
3. You cannot load Windows without first booting from CDROM.

This is what we need to find out:

1. Does the PC detect that there is a USB CDROM drive connected at boot up?
- If not, enable the USB function in the BIOS.
2. Can the BIOS be changed to enable the PC to be boot from USB devices?

*** To answer question 1, when you boot your PC, there should be a list of all the hard drives connected to the motherboard. The CDROM drive should appear in that list. If it does not, there should be an option to enable USB devices in the BIOS.
*** To answer question 2, go into the BIOS and look for an entry which is along the lines of "Boot from USB", or anything to do with enabling the PC to boot from USB devices. Ensure this is enabled.

Now, if you were able to anwser those two questions, you will need to reboot your PC, and after the POST (at which time it should also detect your HDD and your CDROM drive), go into your BIOS:

- Does it now give you the option of selecting your CDROM drive in the boot priority list?

If so, ensure that the CDROM is first in the list, then save your changes and reboot. You will need to keep your eyes on the screen because it will ask you if you wish to boot from the CD (ie. press any key to boot from CD).
If not , you will need to find a friend who can make you a floppy boot disk that will enable both CDROM and USB support, and then launch the Windows Setup disc from the MS-DOS prompt.

Let us know how you get on with those options.......

SORRY!! I just read your post properly - you said you have an internal CDROM Drive? So Floppy and Harddisk are the only two options? Is there anywhere else in the BIOS that will allow you to enable the CDROM? Sorry again!

I don't think that we have the facts straight just yet.

1. this laptop is old and has NO usb ports
2.the bios has no cd rom choice for boot sequence
3.the unit is fitted however with an internal cd rom.
4 bios version is 5.30
5.under hard disk in the bios screen there was no HDD until i installed the replacement which tells me it is detected.

I hope this helps a bit, i don't know how i misled you but i did. thank you...

no problem at all.
i haven't seen any other places to enable the cd rom.
the cd rom does work briefly during the attempt at boot up.

No mate, you didn't mislead me, I just didn't read your post properly.

Okay, so the CDROM is internal but is not detected by the Laptop........

Mmmmm. In the BIOS, does it have the following options anywhere:

"On-chip Primary PCI IDE" and/or
"On-chip Secondary PCI IDE"

..or something similar? If so, what are the values set for them (eg. enabled, disabled, auto, etc...)

Sorry again!

i have strolled thru the bios options and have found nothing resembling,your suggestions. the cd rom does seem to be used slightly in the start-up process,as the light comes on and you can hear it work for a few seconds before the insert system disk message appears.so i wonder if they use the floppy setting in the bios for a removeable cd rom,because the only reason you would remove it would be to insert a removeable floppy drive.so i don't thimk they would want you to change bios settings just to change drives? thank you for all this.

What operating system are you trying to install?

You may need a boot disk, or set of them (floppy).

If it is for Win XP get them here:
How to obtain Windows XP Setup boot disks
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=310994

If it is not, you may need the proper ones for the op system you are trying to install.

i have a complete windows 98 to install and a windows 98 boot disk both on cd....thank you

Install DOS with the cdrom support from http://www.bootdisk.com and then plug in the cd in place of the floppy.

Well smoke, I may be at a loss I think. You did say it was an old laptop - it is quite possible that when it was released, it did not come with a CDROM drive, and as such, the CDROM drivers are not inbuilt with the BIOS....Maybe. If this was the case and it was added after, the drivers would have been loaded via Floppy to get it to work. A such, that means it will not work without first being installed.....mmmmm

Also, when Windows 95 and 98 was being released on CD, they additionally came with a floppy boot disk, primarily aimed at booting to the Command Prompt and enabling the CDROM drive so the Windows disc could be loaded - this may be the case here.

I guess there are a couple of alternatives that I can think of (and I guarantee, I am no expert):

1. See if you can get your hands on a Windows 95/98 bootdisk to enable you to boot up with the CDROM drive (these can be dowloaded from http://www.bootdisk.com/bootdisk.htm). Then insert your Windows CD and see if you can run the setup from there...

2. Toshiba use the "SelectBay" technology (common now), so see if you can get your hands on an alternate one (that definitely works), because it may be that the CDROM in the laptop is already fried....then install Windows and go from there.....

3. When they were first released they came with preloaded software and operating system, I think, so if you did some searching, you might get lucky and will be able to by a second hand hard drive, or maybe another CDROM drive for relatively little money...

Otherwise, I am afraid to say, without actually playing with the laptop myself - I am outta ideas!!

Let me know how it goes either way....and sorry I couldn't be more helpful.

You need a W98 boot disk.

You may be able to get one here:
Bootdisk.com
http://www.bootdisk.com/

You may need to format the drive before you install W98
You need to know if it's W98 or W98SE

If the cd rom won't work after using the bootdisk you may be able to get a set of floppies to install W98 - it came on both cds and floppies.

I have been thinking of adapting a floppy via an adapter to an existing port to try that.i have an external floppy drive that can be adapted to a port...thank you...i'll give it a rip...and thanks for the link.

You may be able to pick up a PCMCIA or parallel cdrom for cheap on ebay.

Thank you all for your help!!!
I did get it to work after all. you guys were right the drivers for the cd-rom are loaded with the start-up floppy, so i found the external floppy drive on ebay for $7.00 and started the windows 98 start-up floppy and allowed cd support. this got the drivers for the cd-rom loaded,after that it was a simple install. thank you again for all the help..!!!!

Excellent. What type of external drive did you get?

I managed to get the factory external floppy drive that originally came with this unit.
thank you again...wayne

That's great. Good job.

Thank you for all the help and the site.