Help end my nightmare with Windows XP upgrade disc!!!!!

[browndog23]

I have had my new system running perfectly for about a week until suddenly got this dreaded error on startup saying "disk read error occured" (see my earlier post) After trying a bunch of different commands such as diskchk etc it came up with an error saying there was an unrecoverable error (or something to the effect!) :?

So i tried to reinstall over the top of my old screwed operating system and it said it wasn`t there and it needed to have a previous operating system, this is because i only have the upgrade cd of XP. Is there any
way of overriding this as this is really causing me a lot of trouble?
I ave dismantled my external hard drive and placed my hard drive from my desktop system in it so that i can connect to my sisters laptop via USB. The whole drive seems to be screwed so i have reformatted it as there isn`t anything of much importance on there.

Are there particuarly files which i should have on the hardrive which i could copy over from my sisters comp in order for the upgrade cd to recognise a previous operating system?

Thanks very much

 

[browndog23]

Just having a think. If i try and install with my upgrade cd and let it go up until it prompts me to insert a valid copy of XP/2000/98 etc then place my cousins full version in the drive, would this work???

 

[Zoron]

If you have a full version of 98, ME or 2000, it will work. Insert one of those CDs when prompted and it will allow you to continue.

 

[browndog23]

If you have a full version of 98, ME or 2000, it will work. Insert one of those CDs when prompted and it will allow you to continue.

Cheers Zoron. What i had to do in the end was borrow my cousins XP and install that on a new hard drive as my copy wouldn`t allow me to copy on to a drive without a windows on it already. Once i had that installed i reinstalled my copy over it and it seems to have worked a treat!

Thank god my computers back!

Thanks