How do I install windows 2000 from an external CD -ROM?

I have a sony sr 5k laptop. I want to reformat the hard drive and reinstall the Windows 2000 professional that is currently on it. It has both external cd and floppy drives. CD drive connects through the pc card slot and disk drive connects through USB. If i reformat, will the computer recognize the devices in order to run the boot diskette and and later the operation system on cd? If not, how would I go about reformatting?

This question was answered on September 15, 2003. Much of the information contained herein may have changed since posting.

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If you are using an external CD- or DVD-ROM drive that is supported by Windows 2000, such as IBM Portable CD-ROM drive CD-20X, do the following:

Start the system

Make Windows 2000 setup boot disks

At the DOS prompt, type the following: RUN scr_cd:\bootdisk\MakeBoot.exe where scr_cd is the letter of the CD-ROM drive of your computer

Then follow the instructions on the screen

Insert Windows 2000 setup boot disk 1 in the external diskette drive, and restart the system Follow the instructions on the screen

If you are using an external CD- or DVD-ROM drive that is not supported by Windows 2000, do the following:

Start the system in DOS mode

Insert the Windows 2000 Professional CD into the external CD-ROM drive

Make a temporary directory For example, at the DOS prompt, type the following:

MD c:\win2000

Copy all the cabinet (.CAB) files and installation programs from the Windows 2000 CD-ROM to the temporary directory At the DOS prompt, type the following: XCOPY src_cd:\i386 c:\win2000 /S where scr_cd is the letter of the CD-ROM drive of your computer, and c:\win2000 is the temporary directory that was created in step 2

At the DOS prompt, type the following: c:\win2000\WinNT

Follow the instructions on the screen

After installing Windows 2000, install Windows 2000 SP1, provided by Microsoft (R) Refer to the document in it on how to install Windows 2000 SP1.

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Posted by Student of Katharine Gibbs School - New York on September 15, 2003

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