How to install with no floppy drive for system disk?

[Ted Kerin]

I'm trying to pump a little life into an old laptop (for my youngest kid)
that has no floppy drive. (It used an external floppy drive, now gone and
obsolete, that plugged into the parallel port -- there's no USB port.)

I felt that a reformatting and clean reinstall of Win95B was needed. I had
a system disk as a floppy, but none as a CD, so I tried burning the contents
of the floppy onto a CD. Then I reformatted the HD, set the CMOS on the
laptop to boot off the CD-ROM drive, and tried to boot off the CD, so that I
could then re-install Windows.

No good -- "invalid system disk".

I tried downloading a generic Win95B startup disk from Bootdisk.com, and
burned that onto a CD, but I had the same problem -- "invalid system disk".
This download, like my original system disk, was intended to be on a floppy,
which may be the problem.

Is there any way I can create a bootable CD, from the floppy, other than
simply copying the contents of the floppy onto a CD? Or, are there sources
where I can download suitable files for burnng onto a CD, to make a Win95B
system disk?

Or any other way for me to install Windows off the CD?

Ay help would be appreciated!

[John Dulak]

Ted:

To create a bootable CD the CD burning software has to be told
explicitly to create a bootable CD.

In Nero go to File | New.. and when the dialog box opens scroll down
the graphic images on the left to find the "bootable CD" option. You
will then need an image to use as a template a boot floppy or hard disk
that is small enough to fit on a CD will work. You can then copy other
things to the CD. When you use it to boot you then copy the install
files to a folder on the laptop HDD and go to town.

HTH & GL

John
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[Ted Kerin]

Thanks, John! The "bootable CD" option doesn't appear in the default menu or
my usual work-flow in Nero, but your post was helpful, so that I could find
it. And why old Win95 machine lives again.

"John Dulak" <jo...@Booogus.com> wrote in message
news:42DF01...@Booogus.com...

[John Dulak]

Ted Kerin wrote:
>
> Thanks, John! The "bootable CD" option doesn't appear in the default menu or
> my usual work-flow in Nero, but your post was helpful, so that I could find
> it. And why old Win95 machine lives again.

Ted:

Glad it worked out for you and thanks for letting us know you got it
working