"Error loading operating system"
 

Hey guys-

My brother's hard disk went out on his Dell so I'm installing an older 45 gig IBM of mine for him. I took his out, put mine in, and booted up. I was prompted to install a boot disk, so I put in the XP disk. I created a partition and formatted the drive. At 99%, it seemingly froze as I could hear the HDD making repetitve noises as if it was searching or lost...
After 10 minutes of this, I turned it off figuring everything would be ready or that I would start over. Now, after a Dell opening screen (no POST or Bios option), it says "error loading operating system". I've never worked with a Dell before but have they somehow enabled Bios manipulation? I unplugged the drive and everything worked fine and it loaded the XP install startup but obviously couldn't locate a drive.
What next?
Thanks
-Tim

Hmm, corrupted XP CD, perhaps? Make sure it isn't scratched or dirty.

Sounds like the CD or either the hard drive itself. I doubt it's the hard drive though. Also check the RAM. That gives a boatload of errors if it's a stick gone bad.

Thanks for the quick help guys. I was able to get into Bios with F2 (never used F2 for it before) and set it up to boot from CD because it changed itself to HDD during the setup. Everything is up and running now ;)
-T