# Recommend me a solution... please.



## Techtu (Aug 5, 2010)

Right... as it happen's my sister has brought a netbook, however it needs formatting and for some reason it doesn't want to boot from my usb memory stick - I'm guessing that's due to me using a M2 card & usb adapter. Anyways now that leave's me to having to use a external dvd drive, this is something i refuse to buy as it's not for me, so she's settled on buying an external dvd drive enclosure so we can put my dvd drive into that and then format her netbook. Now the problem is the enclosure I seen isn't there no more (on an online site), so that leave's me trying to find a enclosure what is suitable and cheap enough for her to be happy to buy, bare in mind she only spent £40 for the netbook in the first place so doesn't want to pay around the same to get it working. which makes sense i guess.

so please if there's any UK guys about who know of any good enclosures or something to help me out then i'll be very grateful 

EDIT: Another question is... would a external hard drive caddy do the same job?


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## temp02 (Aug 5, 2010)

Perhaps the boot devices order are not set so that the USB device is booted prior to the internal HDD, check if by pressing one of these keys, at BIOS boot time, you can see the USB card reader on a menu and select it to boot: ESC, F2, F8 or F10.
If not, the USB card reader needs specific drivers and cannot be accessed at boot time.

As for the enclosure, I cannot be of assistance, only had one experience with one of those a few years back and it ended up pretty bad (killing two of my USB ports and the internal HDD), cheap stuff ended up costing more than a branded one.

*EDIT:* No, caddies are nothing but enclosures, they provide no PATA/SATA to USB connection, putting it in a simple way, it's just a box.
After a quick "googling" it seems that an external caddy is just another name for external enclosure, so as long as it provides an external USB connection you can use it, just be careful when choosing the internal connection, SATA or IDE/PATA, that best suit your needs (depending on the HDD connection that you are gonna use to put in it).


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## 95Viper (Aug 6, 2010)

Curious.... What netbook?
Did you use FAT or FAT32 to format the card?

Some netbook bioses have been updated to recognize more devices to use and such, so you might want to update her bios, if it is older.

Also, maybe these links can help:
UNetbootin
Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool
Install Windows 7 From USB Drive [Requires 2 Simple Steps]

You don't mention which OS you are going to install, so I just got W7 links.
Hope this helps.

Edit: the latest unetbootin for windows is 485 from here>http://sourceforge.net/projects/unetbootin/files/UNetbootin/485/unetbootin-windows-485.exe/download


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## netieb (Aug 6, 2010)

Just get the hard disk out the netbook connect to your pc and format! Ready problem solved.


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## TechPowerDown (Aug 6, 2010)

Use a flash drive instead of a card reader.


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## Techtu (Aug 6, 2010)

Using an external HDD caddy just isn't going to work in the long term as it would mean me having to destroy the casing of the caddy to be able to fit a DVD drive to the connections.

The netbook is also on Windows XP not 7 and she is not prepared to pay for a new OS. So must have something what will work with XP - Sorry about not mentioning that 96Viper.

@netieb... that is not possible as windows work's with the BIOS and should not be able to run on another rig unless reinstalled, sometimes it may boot on a different system as I've experienced, but it is not wise to do so as problems will occur.

EDIT: @ TechPowerDown, would be a clever idea that, why I never thought about that before I don't know, but thank's for the top tip! surely my sister won't mind spending £10 or so, which is less than what I told her an external drive bay would cost.


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## 95Viper (Aug 6, 2010)

netieb said:


> Just get the hard disk out the netbook connect to your pc and format! Ready problem solved.



True, however, some netbooks have to be taken apart to do that.


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## netieb (Aug 7, 2010)

I dont mean take it out and start form another rig. Just take it out connect it with another rig but boot up with the rigs hdd and format the netbooks hdd, cant be that difficult have it done countless times.


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## Techtu (Aug 7, 2010)

it's not the formatting I' having a problem with, it's installing a clean OS


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## DRDNA (Aug 7, 2010)

Tech2 said:


> however it needs formatting and for some reason



I would really like to know what the reason is as there maybe a better solution if that info was known.


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## Mussels (Aug 7, 2010)

the reason it didnt detect was because he used a card reader, which didnt show up as a compatible device.


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## DRDNA (Aug 7, 2010)

Mussels said:


> the reason it didnt detect was because he used a card reader, which didnt show up as a compatible device.



No ...WHY does the netbook need to be reformatted in the first place?


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## Mussels (Aug 7, 2010)

DRDNA said:


> No ...WHY does the netbook need to be reformatted in the first place?



maybe it came with the wrong OS for their needs, or all sorts of crap installed with it they dont want?


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## DRDNA (Aug 7, 2010)

yup maybe...but who really knows..
If its a virus then there mabe a better solution.
If its a harddrives issue with corruption there maybe a better solution.
If its...if its...if its...see where I am coming from>?


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## Mussels (Aug 7, 2010)

DRDNA said:


> yup maybe...but who really knows..
> If its a virus then there mabe a better solution.
> If its a harddrives issue with corruption there maybe a better solution.
> If its...if its...if its...see where I am coming from>?



wrong thread - ignore this post


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## Techtu (Aug 7, 2010)

As far as I'm aware, it was some young girl's before hand, she however is a typical teen, so yes it did get infected with virus's but by the time I got my hands on it the thing won't even boot into window's, even via safemode.

So a clean install is the only option.


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## DRDNA (Aug 7, 2010)

Mussels said:


> it cant be a virus, that wont stop the PC turning on.
> 
> hard drive would make it lock up during the POST test (or just not appear there/giving errors)
> 
> ...





Tech2 said:


> As far as I'm aware, it was some young girl's before hand, she however is a typical teen, so yes it did get infected with virus's but by the time I got my hands on it the thing won't even boot into window's, even via safemode.
> 
> So a clean install is the only option.




Take the harddrive out and slave it then scan it with malewarebytes and antivirus program then run disk repair on it too and see if that cleans it up..Do this all from a different PC.


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## Mussels (Aug 7, 2010)

DRDNA said:


> Take the harddrive out and slave it then scan it with malewarebytes and antivirus program then run disk repair on iot too and see if that cleans it up..Do this all from a different PC.



i had two threads open and got confused, my comment can be ignored. i thought this was the thread with the laptop not booting.


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## DRDNA (Aug 7, 2010)

Mussels said:


> i had two threads open and got confused, my comment can be ignored. i thought this was the thread with the laptop not booting.



Its all good...I know we are just trying to help...


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## Techtu (Aug 7, 2010)

To be able to run the repair disc I would need need to have a windows disc on hand, which i do, just not a way to insert it into the netbook  hence this thread being made 

I think I'll go to the local store and pick her up a cheap 4gb memory stick just so I can install XP for her, seem's the easiest way to do it to me.


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## Mussels (Aug 7, 2010)

Tech2 said:


> To be able to run the repair disc I would need need to have a windows disc on hand, which i do, just not a way to insert it into the netbook  hence this thread being made
> 
> I think I'll go to the local store and pick her up a cheap 4gb memory stick just so I can install XP for her, seem's the easiest way to do it to me.



XP is a real pain to install from a flash drive, its not going to work as easily as vista or 7.


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## DRDNA (Aug 7, 2010)

no not repair by OS disk but , repair by selecting to detect errors  and auotmatically fix from the PC you slave the netbook drive from.


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## Techtu (Aug 7, 2010)

ahhh I know what you mean now! 

Well I'm off for a bit and i'll be sure to post back with some more info on how thing's are going with this.

Thanks for your advice guys


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## DRDNA (Aug 7, 2010)

Tech2 said:


> ahhh I know what you mean now!
> 
> Well I'm off for a bit and i'll be sure to post back with some more info on how thing's are going with this.
> 
> Thanks for your advice guys



be sure to do the malwarebytes first and virus scan too before disk repair then maybe one more time afterwords... Now if that fixes it all is good but if there are areas that are unfixable for some reason, but its fixed enough to boot you could always ghost the drive from there to a known good harddrive and your up and going again on a harddrive that is good.


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## 95Viper (Aug 7, 2010)

netieb said:


> I dont mean take it out and start form another rig. Just take it out connect it with another rig but boot up with the rigs hdd and format the netbooks hdd, cant be that difficult have it done countless times.



Not difficult... true, just stating for the OP that it is not like a notebook on some models and I have done it countless times, too.

The Wind I just set-up had nine screws, 12 tabs (platics tabs are a bit*h as not to snap off), remove the wi-fi card, then remove the screws holding the drive, take out drive and  put in re-placement drive, memory and reverse, etc.  For me... easy.



Tech2 said:


> ahhh I know what you mean now!
> 
> Well I'm off for a bit and i'll be sure to post back with some more info on how thing's are going with this.
> 
> Thanks for your advice guys



Doesn't that thing have a recovery partition?


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## timta2 (Aug 8, 2010)

> XP is a real pain to install from a flash drive, its not going to work as easily as vista or 7.



Yeah, I've done this to do a reinstall on a laptop that had a broken DVD drive that wouldn't read. It wasn't all that difficult although it wasn't as easy as installing from DVD. There are quite a few tools and tutorials (found by Googling I'm sure) that makes it painless. I think it took me 2 hours total with most of it done while I was watching a movie.


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## Techtu (Aug 8, 2010)

There is files missing what the OS needs to boot, so I'll just make her (my sister) buy a USB memory stick considering it's for her.

Thanks for the advice again guy's.


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## Techtu (Aug 8, 2010)

Just wondering if a Samsung 2gb (SD) Secure Digital Card will be suitable to make a windows XP install disc from? 

I hear that some type's won't do it, I have no idea why.


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## brandonwh64 (Aug 8, 2010)

I didnt read all the posts except the first one but this is what i use on my wifes netbook and its a great buy cause you can find SO MANY uses for it!!

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812156102&cm_re=bytecc_usb_adapter-_-12-156-102-_-Product


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## erixx (Aug 8, 2010)

a must have indeed


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## Techtu (Aug 8, 2010)

That's something I'll get for myself for sure at a later stage, but right now just knowing if that SD card will be ok to make a windows xp install from it? even more so as it's something for my sister and  then it'll always be kept in a safe place for if ever needed again... knowing her i'll need it at some point or other again.


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## Mussels (Aug 9, 2010)

Tech2 said:


> That's something I'll get for myself for sure at a later stage, but right now just knowing if that SD card will be ok to make a windows xp install from it? even more so as it's something for my sister and  then it'll always be kept in a safe place for if ever needed again... knowing her i'll need it at some point or other again.



its all up to the card reader, not the memory card.


i've got an external USB one (not bootable) and an internal floppy bay one - and it IS bootable.


just go buy a 2-4GB flash drive (imation always worked for me, with bootable drives), format it to fat32 and find some tools to let you make a bootable XP installer.


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## TechPowerDown (Aug 9, 2010)

I still reccomend what i suggested at the begining, go buy a 4gig flash drive for $10 at any hardware store, as Mussels said, it would be your card reader, not thie memory card itself, and a suffiecent sized memory card is about the same price as a flash drive.


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## Techtu (Aug 12, 2010)

Ok so I have a USB flash drive - 4Gb ......... wish it was oh so simple as that but it's not, the boot stick I made work's just fine on my rig, infact I was so amazed at how quick the start up was from USB compared to CD that I'm pretty sure I'm going to get myself one for my Win7 

However on this occasion it seem's the Dell Mini doesn't wan't to get as past the "starting windows" screen, well it does just, but it goes black and leave's me with the mouse cursor... oh the joy's


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## 95Viper (Aug 12, 2010)

How long are you waiting, it takes a  few seconds on the netbooks.

Just some FYI.
Don't know which processor that mini has, but a n270 is not 64 bit, but a n450 is.
I put windows 7 on a Wind and was beating my brains out why it would not install right, then I realized... I was using my 64 bit usb stick, not the 32 bit.  But, all turned out well, when I did it right. I ain't right until I get my caffeine.


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## Techtu (Aug 13, 2010)

Tech2 said:


> I waited 13 minutes at one point, which was the longest I was prepared to wait haha.
> 
> Yes it has only the 32bit N270 CPU, I also only have a 32bit version so no chances of me getting it wrong on the netbook (like I did my own rig last week
> 
> Quite strange now, at first I thought it was the adaptor I was using for a memory card, but maybe it wasn't that after all, ... or maybe it was as this is actually the furthest I've got with it so far, and still yet so far to go  ... I really should go make my sistr go buy an external dvd drive for herself so I never have to deal with her again





Tech2 said:


> ... So as it has it I ditched Windows and went to do an install of Ubuntu from USB using Universal USB Installer which told me there was one error and the setup isn't bootable.
> 
> any idea's?





Tech2 said:


> oppps, how stupid can ya get...
> 
> it didn't want to install when formatted the USB as NTFS, had to be FAT32.





Ok... so I was wrong yet again, I get this error when trying to install Ubuntu "Input/output error during write on /dev/sda" So I guess that mean's the USB drive isn't capable?


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