cant boot with usb cd-rom

[luv2liv]

my sharp mm10 doesnt have a cd-rom. so im using one of those external usb cd-rom. the problem is, the laptop wont recognize the ext usb drive upon booting up. windows xp has not problem with the ext drive.

i need to do a clean install of windows or even a nice n small linux. how can i force the laptop to see the ext drive upon booting? is there a trick? maybe create a usb flash drive thats bootable?f

thanks!

 

[Peter]

Whatever boot device you attempt to use, the machine's BIOS will have to bring the boot support for it. Check there whether you can enable something in this direction.

 

[luv2liv]

i have usb boot enabled. apparently this thing is picky with usb cd. it has to be a certain type....

im hoping theres a way to dump the windows xp install files onto usb and fool the pc to think its a bootable cd

 

[Peter]

That won't work. Bootable CDs are special in their fundamental format - it's not in the files, simply speaking.

 

[RebateMonger]

Sharp Actius MM10 Recovery Disk with USB CD-ROM

"The Sharp MM10 is a very lightweight notebook computer with no internal floppy or cd-rom drive. If you need to reinstall the operating system, there is a recovery disk included, but no obvious way to use it. Several calls to support generated the following information:

The default CMOS setup is programmed to ignore the CD-ROM drive, but you can set the system to boot from the USB cd-rom drive:

1) restore factory defaults
2) set CD-ROM first in the boot sequence
3) set USB Boot to "enable"
4) set Plug&Play to "NO" under "advanced"
5) Disable Quick boot
6) Disable Quiet boot (???)

These settings must be correct for the CD-ROM to be used as a boot device, although only a couple are mentioned in the manual or known to any one technician. The big surprise is turning off plug and play, since of course XP Home is a plug and play compatible OS. During the OS restore, the CMOS settings will be automatically modified to reverse all the above settings and disable 802.11b system."

 

[Nocturnal]

Most times the BIOS will recognize that there is an external CDROM drive. Does it recognize it when you go into the BIOS settings?

 

[luv2liv]

rebatemonger, i saw that and tried it already. too bad it didnt work. im thinking the usb cd has to be special. maybe my plug n play usb cd is not good enough

the laptop's recovery cd is xp home edition. surprisingly, when i put my xp media center, i was able to install it within the windows os!!