Flash installer ISO to HDD help

[da na]

Backstory: HDD caddy in old laptop is broken. Replaced CD drive with HDD adapter. Now I need a way to install an OS without a CD, it does not boot from USB so that is not an option.

Thus, I need to flash the XP install ISO to one partition of the HDD, leave the rest unpartitioned, create a partition in the unpartitioned space, and when Windows is working I will erase the ISO partition.

But how do I do this? Rufus does not recognize the HDD as a device the ISO can be flashed onto. Any other software I can use to burn images to disk?

[RandomLegoBrick]

does it support netboot? I think its usually called pxe boot in the bios or something along those lines

 

Edit. if all thats broken is the caddy then cant you just tape the drive into the original bay and then install to it from a dvd then move the drive back into the adapter?

[da na]

3 minutes ago, RandomLegoBrick said:

Edit. if all thats broken is the caddy then cant you just tape the drive into the original bay and then install to it from a dvd then move the drive back into the adapter?

It uses some goofy IDE adapter and the part the adapter plugs into is broken. I have the adapter but it's no good since this stupid proprietary connector doesn't work right, unfortunately.

4 minutes ago, RandomLegoBrick said:

netboot? I think its usually called pxe boot or something along those lines

Fair, I could use PXE - I am not sure how well it will work with a Windows XP ISO, I guess I'd have to run ad hoc to another computer since I don't have Ethernet...

[da na]

@Windows7ge sorry to bother you but I know you're an expert in PxE... how would I even go about setting up an XP/7 installer ad hoc?

[RandomLegoBrick]

I didnt realize you were trying to install windows xp, there are tons of tools for linux and windows 10 pxe installers but I cant find any up to date tutorials for a windows xp install without windows server...

 

I think you could install windows xp onto the drive from another machine and then move it back to the laptop before installing drivers etc.

[da na]

16 minutes ago, RandomLegoBrick said:

I think you could install windows xp onto the drive from another machine and then move it back to the laptop before installing drivers etc.

sadly that is not how XP works, drivers have to be configured for that exact laptop. I have a rather extensive collection of classic laptops but this is one of the only AMD-based ones I own, so drivers would not be intercompatible with any other systems I own.

[Windows7ge]

26 minutes ago, da na said:

@Windows7ge sorry to bother you but I know you're an expert in PxE... how would I even go about setting up an XP/7 installer ad hoc?

There are some prerequisite conditions you would have to meet but it might not be impossible. I can't remember, does Windows XP have a Setup.exe file inside?

[da na]

11 minutes ago, Windows7ge said:

There are some prerequisite conditions you would have to meet but it might not be impossible. I can't remember, does Windows XP have a Setup.exe file inside?

Yes, the ISO appears to.

I'll put PxE on hold for a bit because with a CD emulator I was able to put the ISO on the HDD, make the laptop think it was booting from a CD-ROM drive on that IDE port, and install XP. It's formatting, but It may fail to boot from the install after this is complete.

[Electronics Wizardy]

Do you have anouther system? Id do the first part of the install where it copies the files from the bootable usb on a different system. Then when it does the first reboot move the drive over to the laptop and it should do the boot up. I believe all the system specific configs are done after this part, so it should affect drivers or performance.

[Windows7ge]

15 minutes ago, da na said:

Yes, the ISO appears to.

I'll put PxE on hold for a bit because with a CD emulator I was able to put the ISO on the HDD, make the laptop think it was booting from a CD-ROM drive on that IDE port, and install XP. It's formatting, but It may fail to boot from the install after this is complete.

I decided to investigate what I considered the easiest method of network installing Windows but Windows XP is definitely depreciated. It's no longer supported.

 

 

You might, maybe get away with Windows 7 but you'd need a much older version of WinPE to try and do this with XP. Go forward with your current idea and let's hope it works.

[mariushm]

If it's ide, then it should be a 44 pin ide connector, just a 40 pin with 4 extra pins for power.

 

You should be able to use a ribbon cable with two connectors to connect both drive and cd/dvd at same time on the connector, here's an example cable : http://www.cablesonline.com/102driv44pin.html

I'm around 80% sure it would work, as long as you can set drive and optical drive have jumpers to set one to master and one to slave.

 

Alternatively, I think Windows 2003 will work just fine on such old laptop, and it should be possible to start the install process on a computer, let the text mode installation part at the beginning copy the files to disk then after it will ask for a reboot and at the reboot you should be able to just move the hard drive to the laptop and it should work.

Windows 2003 is like Windows XP 64 bit, the drivers for windows xp will work on it, and all you need to do is go to services to enable windows audio service and maybe go in display settings to enable hardware acceleration for video playback - these are disabled by default because windows 2003 is a server os, and servers didn't need audio.

If you're interested and want to test it out I have the iso images for it and can make them available to you if you want, pm me.

[da na]

30 minutes ago, mariushm said:

If it's ide, then it should be a 44 pin ide connector, just a 40 pin with 4 extra pins for power.

 

You should be able to use a ribbon cable with two connectors to connect both drive and cd/dvd at same time on the connector, here's an example cable : http://www.cablesonline.com/102driv44pin.html

I'm around 80% sure it would work, as long as you can set drive and optical drive have jumpers to set one to master and one to slave.

 

Alternatively, I think Windows 2003 will work just fine on such old laptop, and it should be possible to start the install process on a computer, let the text mode installation part at the beginning copy the files to disk then after it will ask for a reboot and at the reboot you should be able to just move the hard drive to the laptop and it should work.

Windows 2003 is like Windows XP 64 bit, the drivers for windows xp will work on it, and all you need to do is go to services to enable windows audio service and maybe go in display settings to enable hardware acceleration for video playback - these are disabled by default because windows 2003 is a server os, and servers didn't need audio.

If you're interested and want to test it out I have the iso images for it and can make them available to you if you want, pm me.

This is not IDE, it uses a weird little connector that needs to be adapted into IDE for the HDD. 
I figured it out and the laptop is running great now, needed to enable "List USB hard drives" in Rufus to be able to flash the installer image to the HDD.