I have a toughbook CF-27E series, which I've recently had to reinstall all the software and device drivers. When I inserted the bootup disk and go through the motion, at the end it tells me there is no cd rom. It's an external cd rom and connects by usb port.

Any way I can fix this?

Thanks

Hello cf27, welcome to PCHF.

Many PC's and and laptop's dont have the ability to pickup USB devices at this point, in fact there are very few that do and I know, but these old IBM's certainly don't. These laptops normally come with internal CD-ROM's?

__________________

Links: myFavoritesHomepage, Submit your URL to cyberJuice USA / UK online shopping links and blogs

Thank you for the welcome :-)

Unfortunately I have a toughbook and it doesn't have the internal cd rom. Someone suggested that I get the original boot disk, as mine may be corrupted or get the original config.sys for it. Unfortunately I haven't been able to locate anything, but I'll keep looking.

Thanks

hmm, no, you'll still end up back at square one. The best way forward is getting those installation files on the laptop and the installing Windows from there. What made you decide to re-install Windows in the first place, can we still access it?

__________________

Links: myFavoritesHomepage, Submit your URL to cyberJuice USA / UK online shopping links and blogs

It completely crashed, when I rebooted I got the two error messages.

Save to disk partition not found
Save to disk feature is disabled

Then the screen stayed blank after that. I tried everything then finally had to use the recovery disk that came with it. Then I ran into a problem with that, I think cause the partition isn't registering right. I received an error message when I tried to recovery.

There are no acceptable devices for image recovery

So I contacted panasonic, whom sent me to the canada site for the 1st aid disk. Unfortunately I don't know how to use it, and I've contacted them several times for assistance, ultimately they keep telling me to follow the reinstalling instructions. That would be ok if it all went exactly as the steps stay to do. They told me that it should read the usb port for the cd rom, yet it isn't. So now I sit frustrated at this laptop which won't go any further than dos.

OK, the "Save to disk partition" is the area of the disk where your OS (Windows) is saved to - hybernation mode. It can easily be corrupted if the laptop switches off whilst saving it's data.

I've not seen that error "There are no acceptable devices for image recovery" before (but then have not seen this recovery disk you speak of), and not sure if this relates to your CD-ROM or HDD. The disk you used, was it a CD or floppy? And if CD, do you have a spare floppy drive and floppy disk we can use to investigate this problem further?

Finally, can you check you BIOS (normally F1, F2 or [DEL]). Have a little snoop around to see if you can see your Hard Drive listed here? We need to confirm the the Hard Drive itself is OK.

__________________

Links: myFavoritesHomepage, Submit your URL to cyberJuice USA / UK online shopping links and blogs

It's a floppy and CD combined, takes me into an image recovery window. This is a second hand laptop so I'm not even sure if these are the original software. Most likely not! I had to dig around to find a boot disk for win98se. I have a legal win 98se cd.

Some how I manage to get the cd to do a check image on the hd. I looked in the BIOS, but not sure what I was looking for...lol

I believe the hd is a Toshiba, again I'm not sure.

I'll up-date status of the check image thing.

OK, so Windows 98 is what is currently installed?

Lets check the status of your HDD. Download and run a Windows 98se Startup disk from here: Bootdisk.Com - Free Windows Bootdisks, Free DOS boot disk

Use the disk, and at the command prompt, can you type in c: and tell me what happens?

__________________

Links: myFavoritesHomepage, Submit your URL to cyberJuice USA / UK online shopping links and blogs

HDD is a Toshiba MK1016GAP Version: U1.12A

Yes I get the C: promt that's all.

I did at one time manage to reinstall win98se, but when I shut the laptop down. I couldn't get back in to windows again.

I finally got the save to partition all set...WOOHOO!!!

Now I need the find out what devices are in my laptop and who they are made by. As I need all the original drivers, due to the fact that my recovery cd/fd is corrupted and no longer any good.

I contacted panasonic to see if I could purchase the original cd/fd, but they have yet to get back to me.

So of course once again I'm stuck up that river without the paddle.

If anyone know's where I can purchase all the original drivers and software, I'd greatly, greatly appreciate it :-)