I bought a 60gb laptop harddrive to try and replace and upgrade in an older laptop of mine this last summer. However, when I tried to install the copy of Windows 2000 that I had it kept saying that the drive was "to large." After a while I decided that I wanted to play with Linux on it and so I installed ZenWalk (yes its an old laptop PIII 667 I believe) anyways, I got bored with that and just set the laptop aside. Well I just bought an external enclosure for the drive as I will be getting married soon and can use it as a backup for those important things (no not pron). However, when I plug the drive in I hear a slight clicking and windows does not recognize the drive. Now I know that it is not recognizing it because it is not considered a "formatted" drive, but is there anyway that I can boot my desktop to recognize the drive via usb and install windows from the cdrom? Thanks in Advance
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- Thread starter gregnash
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It kind of sounds like it's not getting enough juice. I hear that it's not that uncommon with usb powered enclosures, though it seems like a laptop drive should be a little less vulnerable. If there's an external power supply then try it. Also make sure that it's plugged into a powered usb port. Of course, it could just be smoked too... Either way, good luck. 
As far as booting from it, it'll depend on motherboard support for booting from usb. You could copy all the install files from the cd from inside windows if you can get that far, but it'll still come down to needing to tell the board to look at it first in the boot order. I had an old laptop that I needed to get an os onto years ago (no cd-rom built in), and I just picked up an ide to laptop ide adapter and plugged it into my desktop. The adapter cost me something like $10, and for what it was I almost felt ripped off, but it was cool when it worked. I copied the whole cd over onto the drive, started the install process, and when it rebooted, I just took it out and put it into the laptop again so as not to confuse windows by changing a bunch of hardware after it was installed. Worked great for me (and windows never asked for the cd again either).
As far as booting from it, it'll depend on motherboard support for booting from usb. You could copy all the install files from the cd from inside windows if you can get that far, but it'll still come down to needing to tell the board to look at it first in the boot order. I had an old laptop that I needed to get an os onto years ago (no cd-rom built in), and I just picked up an ide to laptop ide adapter and plugged it into my desktop. The adapter cost me something like $10, and for what it was I almost felt ripped off, but it was cool when it worked. I copied the whole cd over onto the drive, started the install process, and when it rebooted, I just took it out and put it into the laptop again so as not to confuse windows by changing a bunch of hardware after it was installed. Worked great for me (and windows never asked for the cd again either).
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So, has it not yet been formatted in NTFS?
Thanks,
yeah I have been looking for a 2.5" to 3.5" IDE adapter but no one around here that I can find has them in stock. On Monday I have to check my local CompUSA to see if they have them. I have not gotten into my BIOS yet to see if it has the ability to boot from USB device but as it is a newer board I am sure it has the ability to boot from USB. I was trying to avoid that but it looks as thought I am going to have to go that route. Thanks for the help guys. I really hope that the clicking sound I am hearing is not that the drive has bricked.
yeah I have been looking for a 2.5" to 3.5" IDE adapter but no one around here that I can find has them in stock. On Monday I have to check my local CompUSA to see if they have them. I have not gotten into my BIOS yet to see if it has the ability to boot from USB device but as it is a newer board I am sure it has the ability to boot from USB. I was trying to avoid that but it looks as thought I am going to have to go that route. Thanks for the help guys. I really hope that the clicking sound I am hearing is not that the drive has bricked.