can you reboot from a extertnal cd drive

hi

concerning me cf-28 ,can you reboot from a external cd drive as me windows will not open and i only have a floppy disc drive

 

Sorry
Only the newer toughbooks allow boot from usb cd
The cd drive /caddys are a good investment
That was the first upgrade I did when I got my first cf-28



Alex

 

if i was to purchase a cd drive would this solve me windows problem,
im not to clued up on computers so any help would be very handy for me
thanks

 

cant you image your hard drive on another computer and just pop it back into the toughbook?

 

Here is a link to the drive a caddy that will work


http://cgi.ebay.com/PANASONIC-TOUGH...5|66:2|65:12|39:1|240:1318|301:0|293:1|294:50


Alex

 

if i was a pc wizard i woudnt ask for help!!!!! euquility

thanks for your help alex

 

57.... Don't worry about him... He has a Toshiba... Toughbooks eat those for breakfast!

There have been several threads lately about how to install an OS without a CD.... But your EASIEST way is to go ahead and pony up the $$ for a CD Rom. If you live in the USA then ebay has them for $50 or so ... Just slide it in, boot to the BIOS and make the CD the bootable drive and load the OS...

 

Yes you could do this. as long as it is a Toughbook image.

To answer the OP, you cannot simply install windoze on an external drive and hook it up to a computer (even a newer Toughbook) and boot off of it... it won't work - it will blue screen.

 

Same with *nix OS's too (though they don't have the BSOD feature!) - Linux, etc. simply will not work unless the OS image is configured *exactly* to suit the hardware config of the system and without intimate, detailed understanding of the way devices are mapped, configured, etc. that can't be done by hand using a raw OS installation using a restore CD or other type of source media.

Craig.

 

Sure you can but not in the conventional way. You just need to create a boot diskette that loads the DOS drivers for your external CD-DRIVE you should be able to get the drivers from the drive mfg website or you may already have them if you bought it new. It's not that difficult but to make it real easy then just buy the Panasonic media bay drive.