When installing Windows XP home on to a computer, when it says "cannot find such and such file" it should be ok to put in a Win XP Pro disk and use those files and swap back to the other disk?

mmm, probably.... its worth a go

aye give it a shot, Ive completed an install just by having a friend MSN me over the files, burning them to a CD-RW and letting windows search that.

Hmm now the laptop comes up with a BSOD

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms793989.aspx

KERNEL_DATA_INPUT_ERROR

TECHNICAL INFORMATION:
STOP: 0x0000007A (0xc03e0730, 0xc0000185, 0xF81cc79D, 0x04BBB860)

Fastfat.sys Address F81CC79D base at F81AE0000, datestamp 41107eb7

Ive done a bit of googling and found out its either the hard drive or the Ram So going to do a Scan disk hopefully, but it is freshly formatted hard drive...

So I think it might be the ram, what do you guys think?

Twats! Cant even do that now!

This is one knackered lappy!!

Your XP disc is knackered, thats why its asking for the location of files during installation.  BSOD is most likely caused by a dodgy installation.

Agreed. Cypher has it.

Quote from: CypherYour XP disc is knackered, thats why its asking for the location of files during installation.  BSOD is most likely caused by a dodgy installation.

Although youd think that most of the sites I found say it could be errors in the RAM or the Hard drive, but i will try and install windows with a disk I know that works, or atleast a different disk before I go changing the RAM or hard drive.

Occams Razor

i dont believe its the disc, i have tried installing many different versions of XP on one machine and it would give me the same problem, missing files or a missing dll exception

sometimes your machine is FUBAR

Quote from: Jaitsui dont believe its the disc, i have tried installing many different versions of XP on one machine and it would give me the same problem, missing files or a missing dll exception

sometimes your machine is FUBAR

agreed ive had it happen twice, once with dodgy RAM, once with a dodgy HDD. A good indicator (for the RAM, not sure with the HDD anyway) is that it will mess up on a different file every now and then when installing. If thats the case its not your cd.

edit: might not be your cd*

for all that is holy and in the name of utterly butterly STOP BUYING CRAP SECOND HAND LAPTOPS MAN!!!!! Cant you save up for a bit and buy something with a warrenty?

It could be either tbh, the best solution is always to try the one that costs the least first, in this case trying a different disc he has spare before going down the RAM/HDD route.

Scan the HDD for bad sectors too before you start and get yourself memtest86 to try and eliminate those.

And stop getting ripped off on ebay

Could even be a dirty lens on your cd-rom.

I didnt buy this laptop, its a friends Evesham machine who asked me to fix it for her.

I got the data from the almost unrecognisable hard drive with a program I cant remember the name of and then Ive tried to install windows with a scratched recovery disk, although that failed and tonight I have downloaded a Virus onto MY pc and it wont load windows now and for some reason it wont detect my CD as a bootable CD either

So now I have got a XP Pro CD key and installing it on this friends lappy and it seems to be working so far.

and Ive only bought 3 laptops on ebay, 1 recieved, 1 refunded and 1 is in a dispute process with paypal.