Please Help - 2000 to XP Horror

[mebirdlady]

Got a Panasonic Laptop CF-37, it had Win 2000 Professional on it...they put XP over that copy...now it is requesting it to be registered and it can't be due to the fact it is already registered to a different computer...want to uninstall this and put on Win 98, but the XP is not located in Add/Remove Programs...was going to fdisk, but cant do it that either...can someone help me with instructions please...

[Duke of Rezin]

Try restarting in Safe Mode and see if "Uninstall Windows XP" is listed. If not you may have to reformat and reinstall whatever other Windows version you want.

[Ferrit]

you need a win 98 setup disk from
www.bootdisk.com
Download it, doubleclick the file it makes a startup disk.Have a good disk ready
Then boot to the floppy disk and get rid of all the non dos partitions and the regular partitions.
Notice when you boot to the setup disk it will load cdrom drivers and assigns a letter to the cdrom usually R:
Switch to the S: with the windows 98 cd in the cdrom and type setup
Hope that helps

[mebirdlady]

I do not have a floppy on this laptop...also...when I run in safe mode it does not give me any options to remove XP..additionally, this laptop did have Windows 2000 Professional on it...I have a CD for that but I can not install over top of XP, it says that the program is older that XP...I have no problem if I need to reformat...just need direction.

[Ya_know]

As long as the Laptop has a CDROM, and it is capable of booting from it, using the 2k CD to boot to the setup is your best option. The reason people were suggesting using the 98 boot disk was because you said you wanted to go to 98. 2000 is definitely the better choice.

When you boot off of the CD, it will give you options to delete the disk partitions and recreate them. That’s where you want to go, the setup (blue screen background) will prompt you, and explain what options are available…just follow it, you shouldn’t have any trouble.

However, be sure that you have all of the drivers for the laptop burned onto a CD. Depending on how new it is, there may not be drivers available in the native 2k install, so things like display, network, and other devices wont run, or will not work correctly until you apply those drivers…

[Ya_know]

hey, hope u don't mind me messaging you...I am having trouble booting from the cd...it gives me an error msg that I am trying to install a program older than that what is on the puter..also....when I try to reformat it says....volume must be dismounted first...all open handles to this volume would then be invalid, would u like to force a dismount on this volume....when u hit Y, it then says Cannot lock the drive

Hope you don't mind me replying here...it's good to have more than one person seeing this error, as I am not particularly familiar with it what you have described.

When you boot from the CD, it should not be in Windows, it should boot directly from the cd. It will tell you as it's going, "Press any key to boot from CD", if you see that, and do that, you will be in the CD setup, which I am guessing is different from where you are currently. It sounds like you are actually in Windows, hence it won’t let you downgrade...

Additional note, you need to ensure the laptop has the CDROM ahead of the Harddrive in the boot order. You need to enter the BIOS/CMOS setup to change that in the event it's not giving you the option…

[mebirdlady]

Actually got it running Windows 2000 again...but now my monitor says on 16 for color not 256...things don't look crisp? any suggestions...and thanks again for all your help

[hermankamp]

Do You Have a driver CD that came with your laptop? you said laptop originally had w2k.
Just checked driver page Panasonics Link does not list Laptops is this an older model or are you overseas perhaps?

Only other possibility is to do a FCC search of your laptop maybe it was made by another manufacturer. unless you can recall what the video was detected as ie S3 Trio/Verge-ATI-TNT Etc.

Herman Kamphorst

[mebirdlady]

I am in North Carolina, I just checked the device mgr and I am in need of drivers for the audio controller, PCI SImple Communications Controller and the Video Controller (VGA Compatible)...I am pulling out my hair

[mebirdlady]

I just found a site for the drivers for the laptop ....
http://tcc.toughbook.com/

[hermankamp]

looks like win2k does not recognise the chipsets and are setting its most generic as detected.

are there any other make or model Nos or type no.? How old is the laptop?
is there an FCC No located on the model No Tag?

let me know if you want me to search from here but i need the answers to the above questions.

Herman kamphorst

[mebirdlady]

laptop was given to me...

fcc reg # 4x2usa-33859-mm-e

modem model # 3com model# 3cn3bm556

[hermankamp]

I'm on the Tough book website there is many updates and drivers checked roughly 3 sets of 30 items from bios to modems and sound Etc.

are you able to download and burn to a cd the drivers you require?
I could download and email them to you .

Herman K

[hermankamp]

The drivers are listing an MB or LB or ND after the CF-37

which is yours?

[mebirdlady]

VB...email is [email protected]