I have a laptop which was runnning Windows 2000 and I'm trying to
install Windows XP on it. I did manage to get it on but I must have
made some mistake somewhere as on startup it was giving me the option
to boot into either XP or Windows 2000.

Before explaining the current status I should just explain exactly
what I'd like to acheive ideally.
One hard drive (C) with the full amount of storage space (10GB)
running Windows XP. That's it! Nothing more, nothing less.

So I have tried to do a few things- deleting partition, re-installing
XP and now I'm really confused!

When I startup now, I get 3 choices from the boot screen:

Windows XP Home Edition
Windows 2000 Professional
Windows XP Setup

If I select Windows XP Home Edition it says:

Windows could not start because of a computer disk hardware

configuration problem. COuld not read from the selected boot

disk. Check boot path and disk hardware. Please check the

Windows documemntation about hardware disk configuration and

your hardware reference manuals for additional information.

If I select Windows 2000 Professional it gets me into Windows 2000. If
I go to Computer Management>Disk Management there it reads:
C: 5GB FAT32 - Primary Partition
Unallocated 4.36GB
Right-clicking on either of these doesn't give me an option to either
delete or format.

If I try Windows XP Home Edition Setup it says:
Welcome to Setup
To set up Windows XP now, press ENTER
Insert the CD labeled Windows XP Home Edition CD ROM
I then put in the disk and press enter.
I then get the following screen:

The following list shows the existing partitions and unpartitioned
space on this computer

9586MB Disk 0 at Id 0 on bus 0 on atapi [MPR]
C: Partition1 (VAIONOTE) [FAT32] 5122MB 979MB free
Unpartioned space 4463MB

If I press 'D' on C, it says: Setup is unable to perform the requested
operation on the slected partition. This partition contains temporary
Setup files that are required to complete the installation.
'D' doesn't work on the unpartitioned space.

If try to set up on C, it says: The partition you have chosen is too
full to contain Windows XP which requires a drive with at least 1033MB
of free disk space.

I also have the following options:
To repair a Windows XP intallation using Recovery Console,

press R
To quite Setup without installing Windows XP press F3

So, what do I do????!!!

Are you booting off the installation CD? I believe you need to boot off
the installation CD. Put in the CD, then boot the computer. If it
doesn't boot off the CD, then boot again, and at the very beginning
press, I think it's F2, to get into Setup. There's usually a brief
message telling you what F function key to press to get into Setup. Get
into Setup, there set the boot sequence to first try to boot off the CD,
then, if there's no suitable CD to boot from, then boot off the hard
drive as choice #2.

Once you boot off the CD, then the hard drive should be free, since it's
all running off the CD, and you should be able to delete all partitions
until you have nothing but free space, then tell it to install Windows
XP into that free space, which should be the entire disk.

(I recall somewhere around there is an option to format the hard drive.
Actually, I think it has to format the hard drive after you delete all
the partitions and tell it to install into the free space. Anyway, see
if that gets you going.)

01steven wrote:
> I have a laptop which was runnning Windows 2000 and I'm trying to
> install Windows XP on it. I did manage to get it on but I must have
> made some mistake somewhere as on startup it was giving me the option
> to boot into either XP or Windows 2000.
>
> Before explaining the current status I should just explain exactly
> what I'd like to acheive ideally.
> One hard drive (C) with the full amount of storage space (10GB)
> running Windows XP. That's it! Nothing more, nothing less.
>
> So I have tried to do a few things- deleting partition, re-installing
> XP and now I'm really confused!
>
> When I startup now, I get 3 choices from the boot screen:
>
> Windows XP Home Edition
> Windows 2000 Professional
> Windows XP Setup
>
> If I select Windows XP Home Edition it says:
>
> Windows could not start because of a computer disk hardware
>
> configuration problem. COuld not read from the selected boot
>
> disk. Check boot path and disk hardware. Please check the
>
> Windows documemntation about hardware disk configuration and
>
> your hardware reference manuals for additional information.
>
> If I select Windows 2000 Professional it gets me into Windows 2000. If
> I go to Computer Management>Disk Management there it reads:
> C: 5GB FAT32 - Primary Partition
> Unallocated 4.36GB
> Right-clicking on either of these doesn't give me an option to either
> delete or format.
>
> If I try Windows XP Home Edition Setup it says:
> Welcome to Setup
> To set up Windows XP now, press ENTER
> Insert the CD labeled Windows XP Home Edition CD ROM
> I then put in the disk and press enter.
> I then get the following screen:
>
> The following list shows the existing partitions and unpartitioned
> space on this computer
>
> 9586MB Disk 0 at Id 0 on bus 0 on atapi [MPR]
> C: Partition1 (VAIONOTE) [FAT32] 5122MB 979MB free
> Unpartioned space 4463MB
>
> If I press 'D' on C, it says: Setup is unable to perform the requested
> operation on the slected partition. This partition contains temporary
> Setup files that are required to complete the installation.
> 'D' doesn't work on the unpartitioned space.
>
> If try to set up on C, it says: The partition you have chosen is too
> full to contain Windows XP which requires a drive with at least 1033MB
> of free disk space.
>
> I also have the following options:
> To repair a Windows XP intallation using Recovery Console,
>
> press R
> To quite Setup without installing Windows XP press F3
>
> So, what do I do????!!!

Oh, I forgot to also say, if you end up with more than one option of
which operating system to boot into, as you had, and you want to remove
one of those options, The info for this is stored in a hidden system
file called BOOT.INI, usually C:\BOOT.INI

In Windows Explorer, go to TOOLS -> FOLDER OPTIONS -> VIEW(tab),
set it to"Show hidden files and folders" and uncheck the box for "Hide
protected operating system files." Then BOOT.INI should show up, and you
can edit that file, remove the unwanted line. (Then set your Windows
Explorer options back to the way they were when you're finished.)

01steven wrote:
> I have a laptop which was runnning Windows 2000 and I'm trying to
> install Windows XP on it. I did manage to get it on but I must have
> made some mistake somewhere as on startup it was giving me the option
> to boot into either XP or Windows 2000.
>
> Before explaining the current status I should just explain exactly
> what I'd like to acheive ideally.
> One hard drive (C) with the full amount of storage space (10GB)
> running Windows XP. That's it! Nothing more, nothing less.
>
> So I have tried to do a few things- deleting partition, re-installing
> XP and now I'm really confused!
>
> When I startup now, I get 3 choices from the boot screen:
>
> Windows XP Home Edition
> Windows 2000 Professional
> Windows XP Setup
>
> If I select Windows XP Home Edition it says:
>
> Windows could not start because of a computer disk hardware
>
> configuration problem. COuld not read from the selected boot
>
> disk. Check boot path and disk hardware. Please check the
>
> Windows documemntation about hardware disk configuration and
>
> your hardware reference manuals for additional information.
>
> If I select Windows 2000 Professional it gets me into Windows 2000. If
> I go to Computer Management>Disk Management there it reads:
> C: 5GB FAT32 - Primary Partition
> Unallocated 4.36GB
> Right-clicking on either of these doesn't give me an option to either
> delete or format.
>
> If I try Windows XP Home Edition Setup it says:
> Welcome to Setup
> To set up Windows XP now, press ENTER
> Insert the CD labeled Windows XP Home Edition CD ROM
> I then put in the disk and press enter.
> I then get the following screen:
>
> The following list shows the existing partitions and unpartitioned
> space on this computer
>
> 9586MB Disk 0 at Id 0 on bus 0 on atapi [MPR]
> C: Partition1 (VAIONOTE) [FAT32] 5122MB 979MB free
> Unpartioned space 4463MB
>
> If I press 'D' on C, it says: Setup is unable to perform the requested
> operation on the slected partition. This partition contains temporary
> Setup files that are required to complete the installation.
> 'D' doesn't work on the unpartitioned space.
>
> If try to set up on C, it says: The partition you have chosen is too
> full to contain Windows XP which requires a drive with at least 1033MB
> of free disk space.
>
> I also have the following options:
> To repair a Windows XP intallation using Recovery Console,
>
> press R
> To quite Setup without installing Windows XP press F3
>
> So, what do I do????!!!

I somehow managed to create a new partition and reinstalled XP.
So, now I have XP running and in Disk Management it shows me:

C: Primary 5GB FAT32
D: Logical Drive 4.35GB FAT 32

Right-clicking on either of these doesn't seem to offer me any
'delete' options, just open, explore, change drive letter and paths,
properties and help.

When I boot up the laptop from cold, it still gives me the option to
boot into 2000 or XP.
How do I get rid of Windows 2000 and have one 10GB space?

On Fri, 4 Apr 2008 01:37:17 -0700 (PDT), 01steven
<01steven@googlemail.com> wrote:

> I have a laptop which was runnning Windows 2000 and I'm trying to
> install Windows XP on it. I did manage to get it on but I must have
> made some mistake somewhere as on startup it was giving me the option
> to boot into either XP or Windows 2000.
>
> Before explaining the current status I should just explain exactly
> what I'd like to acheive ideally.
> One hard drive (C) with the full amount of storage space (10GB)
> running Windows XP. That's it! Nothing more, nothing less.


You're doing it wrong, obviously.

You can't format the Windows drive from within Windows, since that
would leave Windows without a leg to stand on.

Just boot from the Windows XP CD (change the BIOS boot order if
necessary to accomplish this) and follow the prompts for a clean
installation (delete the existing partition by pressing "D" when
prompted, then create a new one).

You can find detailed instructions here:
http://michaelstevenstech.com/cleanxpinstall.html

or here
http://xphelpandsupport.mvps.org/how...windows_xp.htm

or here http://windowsxp.mvps.org/XPClean.htm

or here http://www.webtree.ca/windowsxp/clean_install.htm


Also note that a drive that's only 10GB is *extremely* small for
Windows XP. Most people will not be able to do very much with a drive
that small.

--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP - Windows Desktop Experience
Please Reply to the Newsgroup

01steven wrote:
> I somehow managed to create a new partition and reinstalled XP.
> So, now I have XP running and in Disk Management it shows me:
>
> C: Primary 5GB FAT32
> D: Logical Drive 4.35GB FAT 32
So they're both FAT32? I thought FAT32 could only go up to 2GB, because
I used to have an 8GB hard drive, but it was partitioned into 4 2GB
drives, I thought because 2GB was the max. If you want to keep your
current XP install, well I thought you were starting from scratch, so if
there's nothing to save on the hard drive, the easiest would be to start
over from scratch, boot from the XP install disc, erase the hard drive
by deleting all the partitions, format it with NTFS instead of FAT32,
and let Windows XP install.

Another thing you can try, is to expand/shrink a partition. If there's
free space next to a partition, you can expand the partition into that
free space. (Similarly, if you want to create another partition, you can
shrink an existing partition to get some free space, then make that free
space into a new partition.) I recently did this on windows Vista. But
for Windows XP, try a program called DiskPart.exe, which may or may not
already be there:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d...displaylang=en

And here's a link to some instructions:
http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache...k& cd=1&gl=us

Though to make this really work, you need to defragment your hard drive.
And not just any defragmenter will do. One that will work nicely is
"PerfectDisk", which you can download and use their trial version for
free, and it'll do it.

Good place to get further info on this is in the Linux community, since
they're always installing Linux alongside windows. (The Ubuntu user
forum may be a good place to look.)

For a dual-boot system, with Windows 2000 & XP, 2000 must be on the C:
drive and XP must be on the D: drive. I discovered recently it just
won't work the other way around.

But still, I think starting over, boot off XP CD, delete all partitions,
reformat the hard drive with NTFS, and install XP, and you'll be done in
an hour.

>
> Right-clicking on either of these doesn't seem to offer me any
> 'delete' options, just open, explore, change drive letter and paths,
> properties and help.
>
> When I boot up the laptop from cold, it still gives me the option to
> boot into 2000 or XP.
> How do I get rid of Windows 2000 and have one 10GB space?

David Deley wrote:

>
>
> 01steven wrote:
>
>> I somehow managed to create a new partition and reinstalled XP.
>> So, now I have XP running and in Disk Management it shows me:
>>
>> C: Primary 5GB FAT32
>> D: Logical Drive 4.35GB FAT 32
>
> So they're both FAT32? I thought FAT32 could only go up to 2GB

No, they can be much, much larger than that.
http://support.microsoft.com/search/...=1&spid=global

, because
> I used to have an 8GB hard drive, but it was partitioned into 4 2GB
> drives, I thought because 2GB was the max.

Maybe you had Windows 95A with FAT16?


> For a dual-boot system, with Windows 2000 & XP, 2000 must be on the C:
> drive and XP must be on the D: drive. I discovered recently it just
> won't work the other way around.

There is no such requirements, drive letters are assigned by the (NT)
operating system, the NT operating system could reside on any drive
letter it needed to, (except A: & B:). Windows 2000 could be installed
on drive R: and Windows XP could be installed on drive P:, it is
irrelevant to the proper booting and functioning of the NT installation.

John

On Fri, 04 Apr 2008 20:27:39 -0700, David Deley <deleyd@gte.net>
wrote:

>
>
> 01steven wrote:
> > I somehow managed to create a new partition and reinstalled XP.
> > So, now I have XP running and in Disk Management it shows me:
> >
> > C: Primary 5GB FAT32
> > D: Logical Drive 4.35GB FAT 32

> So they're both FAT32? I thought FAT32 could only go up to 2GB, because
> I used to have an 8GB hard drive, but it was partitioned into 4 2GB
> drives, I thought because 2GB was the max.



No, it's not even close to the max. Windows XP can't *create* a FAT32
volume larger than 32GB, but even that is far from the max, and it
will happily use one much larger than that, it it's first been created
externally.

The theoretical FAT32 limit is 2TB. You are perhaps thinking of the
limit for FAT16, which is 2GB.

--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP - Windows Desktop Experience
Please Reply to the Newsgroup