start xp from fresh with no cd and new hard drive

[unwashed potato!]

a friends dell dimension 8400 pc hard drive broke and cd drive broke a while ago. we replaced the hard drive and cd drive and decided to start again. troulbe was we had no xp cd so downloaded one and used his cd key on the side of the box. this didn't seem to install correctly with many drivers missing.

i downloaded all that dell said was needed from their website but this hasn't fixed the issue which i believe happened when installing xp. is there any way we can get an xp home cd legally so we can install it and then use his CD key?

 

[masterluke]

You need to obtain an OEM install CD. The key on the sticker will most likely not work with a retail XP CD. You should be able to buy an OEM XP cd from Dell.

In the meantime you could consider installing Linux on there just so he has a working system.

EDIT - After re-reading your post, I'm not 100% clear what the problem is. Did it accept the key that you put in or not? What exactly isn't working?

 

[unwashed potato!]

You need to obtain an OEM install CD. The key on the sticker will most likely not work with a retail XP CD. You should be able to buy an OEM XP cd from Dell.

In the meantime you could consider installing Linux on there just so he has a working system.

EDIT - After re-reading your post, I'm not 100% clear what the problem is. Did it accept the key that you put in or not? What exactly isn't working?

a lot seems to have not installed. i thought it was down to not having the correct drivers but after putting all the drivers on that dell provided we haven't got the system back to how it should be. e.g. internet doesn't work, can't standby, the xp theme is the most basic grey one with option to change, no ie was installed etc.

 

[masterluke]

Ok - so the cd key you have appears to work fine otherwise you wouldnt have got as far as you did. I'm guessing that either the XP cd you downloaded is faulty or that you have some other hardware issue that prevented it from completing the install properly.

If you go Start>Run and type in "iexplore" and press enter, what happens?
What sort of internet connection is there? (Ethernet to a router? USB modem? Wireless?)
When you installed windows were there any error messages displayed?

 

[unwashed potato!]

when installing it come up with errors a couple times iirc though can't remember what they were. it's ethernet to a router which needed a driver installed, once it was installed it said it was connected ok but appears to be no internet when trying in firefox (installed with usb).

will try iexplore later when on the pc

 

[masterluke]

ok - the hardware looks pretty standard on those machines so the install should have sailed through without any additional drivers. Errors on XP installation probably means either a motherboard\cpu\memory problem, or a dodgy install cd. You could do worse than trying memtest and a linux livecd on it to see if that works.

 

[SiriusB]

troulbe was we had no xp cd so downloaded one and used his cd key on the side of the box.

I would certainly be trying a proper XP disc before you mess around trying to fix individual problems. Unless the XP .iso you downloaded was from an official/approved Microsoft souce I would say everything points to a dodgy disc.

 

[unwashed potato!]

I would certainly be trying a proper XP disc before you mess around trying to fix individual problems. Unless the XP .iso you downloaded was from an official/approved Microsoft souce I would say everything points to a dodgy disc.

that's what i'm believing is the problem. any way we can download what we need legally as would like to get the problem sorted this weekend if possible

 

[masterluke]

AFAIK there isn't a legal way to do this. I think there is a service for students and corporations where images are made available for download, but if you don't know about that then i guess you probably haven't got this access.