Two quick questions about battery + xp disk

1) Is it safe to use my E1405 on AC power without the battery in it? I don't want to screw around with losing the charge on the battery yet I don't want to risk anything by having it out of my laptop while on AC power.

2) I have a XP MCE disk I got with my laptop from dell (the red one). I'm having some major issues with my desktop (not a dell desktop) and I need to reformat it (not install windows, just erase the HDD). Can I use the red MCE disk that came with my laptop to reformat my desktop (which isn't a dell) and is it posssible to install windows on it?

 

I'm not sure on the first question, i would also like to know if you can do that. But the second, i can help. If you have an original Windows XP installation disk, you can format the computer using that. I think its possible with the Recovery disk as well, but im not 100% sure on that.

 

The only disk I have is the Dell OS disk (XP MCE) and my desktop is a HP (mostly custom now though..only thing from HP on it is the HDD + mobo). So I could reformat my desktop and install xp if I have to with the dell disk?

 

Yes to #1, and #2.

I cannot say that doing #1 is safe. It is kind of unorthodox practise...but I don't see how you can mess up your notebook (as long as any metal pieces dont touch the electrodes in the battery compartment!)

 

Yes, you should be able to format from that CD, as long as it is an OEM CD. However, I don't think that you can install windows from that CD, because it isn't the same one that came with your HP system, from the start. You cannot use the same installation of Windows, on two computers. Did you recieve a CD with the HP, when you bought it?

 

Nope. I have XP home on my desktop and my laptop disk is XP MCE.

 

If you have a XP MCE disk, you can format your desktop with that, but you can't install from that disk, as it's installation is being used on the laptop. The other way to install Windows onto your desktop, would be to see if you got a Windows OEM CD, or a recovery disk with you HP desktop.

 

As 2nd of your question has been answered extensively, I'll be answering the first 1 only: Yes, it's safe to leave it out but if you're in the middle of a project and don't have an APC or Belkin power adapter and the power in your location goes out, you'll loose all your work that's not saved. Hence, leaving it in has advantages and the memory lost on the battery is minimal

 

there is no reason to take the battery out if you're running on a/c. it doesn't hurt the battery. what hurts your battery is heat and running it down/charging it up too much (you have a limited # of lifecycles, so running it down and charging it up like you used to have to do is actually now a terrible idea). leave your battery in. jujube gave you one good reason why you should.