# dell inspiron 3500 cant boot from cd



## barefootjeremy (Oct 4, 2005)

Theres an option in the BIOS to boot from cd and everyone elses inspiron 3500 seems to boot from cd. But no matter what order I put it in the BIOS it wont boot anything (linux live/win install/etc) from cd. hrm...
I flashed the BIOS and dont know anything else to do.
Its a plug & play kind of cd drive. I got it to install windows from cd by using the floppy to boot. But I really need to boot from cd.
suggestions?

or anyone have instructions on using win98 boot disk to make hard drive able to read cd for install. I forgot how I did it the first time. :grin:


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## Volt-Schwibe (Jan 12, 2003)

this is an external cd drive?

how does it connect?

you probably need the internal cd rom that came with it, because an external cdrom is not seen by the bios as a cd-rom. only the internal cd-rom is seen by the bios as a cd-rom, any external usb cd rom is going to be seen by the bios as a usb device.

now, my inspiron 4000 can't boot from usb, and i'd be amazed if your 3500 can.


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## barefootjeremy (Oct 4, 2005)

thanks for quick response!
This is a plug & play floppy/cdrom laptop, IDE(i dont know what type of connection you call it). Its not external in the sense that its not usb or external port. Theres a internal port that you can either plug a floppy or cd drive. 
picture: http://www.micon.com/store/productinfo.asp?SKU=059151

im pretty sure its the only cdrom you can get for this old one. besides external.
Ive read ppl using same model using linux live cds...


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## Volt-Schwibe (Jan 12, 2003)

ok, that is the same one as mine uses.

are sure the windows disc you have is bootable?

try booting with it on another machine.


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## barefootjeremy (Oct 4, 2005)

Yes Im 100% sure any bootable cd doesnt work. However, Last night I decided to hook the laptop hd to my desktop and copy the win98 files for installation. 

just for kicks I reformated c: /s (the 3rd time), but this time from my desktop and not a floppy. 
Then cp the win98 files to it.
Put the hard drive back in along with the cd, and !!!! It booted from cd!

the ONLY thing I did different was format the hard drive while connected to a desktop. I didnt even have to run setup from the hard drive files I copied over. 

I cant believe that would be the solution though. But im happy it works now! :4-dontkno


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## Volt-Schwibe (Jan 12, 2003)

putting it in a desktop computer was going to be my next suggestion, but i wasn't expecting it to be able to boot from cd afterwards like that, i was expecting you would have to install from the copied files.

good thing you got it working though


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