Want to reformat drive to XP from Vista (help!)?

Question

Ok - it's a newly bought laptop and came preinstalled with Vista Home Basic (big mistake on my part) - tho I muddled thru figuring out most fixes and workarounds for stuff, after having downloaded and installed w. updates, it started to unexpectedly shutdown. After having experienced 10 of these within 2 days, I decided I'd reformat the drive and install XP. Only; when trying to boot from the cd, it hangs up w/ blue screen. I went into bios and tried to force it to boot from the cd first - no go. I played around for most of the evening...no luck. Called tech support and they told me that there are NO drivers for this model that'd support XP and that I cannot put XP on it. I don't believe that (this is Vista hell!) - it's a Toshiba Satellite A135-S2356.

Anyway; restored to last week so see if that'd help (thinking that the w. updates were the main culprit) - but now I just have my mind made up - I want XP.

Does ANYBODY have advice?

You've all been helpful - thank you! It is a 64 bit system. I also did try rebooting (more times than I'd like to admit) w/ cd in and pressing the 'effing' keys (lol) to try to get it to do what I want. I'm not a total bonehead - I've formatted and have installed XP on 3 other machines. This one's got me, though. Short of trying to return it or selling it, I may have to try to go w/ the 64 bit XP (if possible).

Correction: it IS a 32-bit system.

Answer 1

tech support could be correct but I do not believe that for a moment, try just putting the xp disc in and restarting then @ startup it should ask boot from cd press any key. and so do so, im in the biz and build /rebuild and this is not right, I have run into most all probs w/vista and xp and can always solve them anyway try that and i'll be thinking on this one I have not heard of such that the tech said, they appaul me so often. also if that does not work with the disc in and restarting @ startup push F3 endlessly @ startup see where that takes you then im not that up on toshiba if F3 doesnt give result restart and go with F8 endlesssly, if that does not work go with F12. also there is a dif in BIOS and CMOS, and I dont want to go into that @ the moment so give it a shot and see what you come up with, you can add me to your im if you have it anyway good luck it can be done ! who pays these techs all the diniro raaaarr!

Answer 2

Yeah, you need a 64 bit OS to match the processor. I'm assuming that you have the CD's for Vista. Why not try to reinstall it, and see what happens?

Or, go ahead and buy the upgrade version of ultimate. That isn't much more expensive than buying XP-64.

I think that a fresh install of Vista might do the trick.

Answer 3

Order the XP CD's for your Toshiba Satellite A135-S2356 from Toshiba. You must use their XP Recovery disks, to avoid driver problems, not a store-bought XP.

This is your only option, if you don't want Vista.

Answer 4

Oh boy i am kinda within the equal boat,however observed this out simply placed the xp cd in an hurry an reboot then hit the distance bar an boot from the cd then get better an layout,beautiful realistic i've discovered however the kicker is,the drivers,eithernet,ect u will have to down load an keep first as i needed to reinsatll vista an then im nonetheless seeking to discover the right drivers an such so i will be able to alternatively placed xp professional in this trendy $897 on sale tower hp vista preumion 500gb rough force ect,however tech stated i had to insall an eithernet card, it dont include one, but it surely does biult in an i did set up one an i obtained again on-line, dsl however cant discover the drivers for the whole lot grrr,please get the drivers first saves alot of reloaden ect an if u discover them percentage okaybe intent im computure eliteret lol thank you god bless a pal in christ jerry/c-m-a member..p.s. vista got here out to quickly its sluggish however first-rate whilst i had the xp professional on gosh it was once like lightning means speedy however want drivers ect to make it paintings appropriately an additionally my flatscreen was once speedy however wanted whatever additionally intent was once giving me a head pain speedy scrollling form of flickering.p.s.s. ya like the man ubaove simply stated lol took the phrases out of my mouth i used to be one who did do this grrrr

Answer 5

I would suggest making your own bootcd with desktop support:
www.ubcd4win.com

All you need is to download the package (the drivers too!) and a windows xp cd.

You have a lot of tools there to use, a cool "how to" do it, and I think you need a full format, including the replacement of the boot manager sector. I hope this will help.

I don't know much about Vista, but I'm 90% sure this might do the trick.

Answer 6

Your vista is 64 bit and your XP is likely 32 bit, the motherboard and processor are therefore 64 bit and incompatible with your XP. Try downloading XP 64 bit version to test to see if it will work. If not, return the laptop if you still can.

Answer 7

i would get toshiba repair xp discs for your satelite pc....then reformat the hardrive and load the repair discs in ...(if you do not want vista get the repair disks from the same model but 6 months earlier from toshiba) i have dual os on my toshiba Qosimo xp media center on one drive and vista premeum on the other. so I can be sane while figuring out the new one...)it was not fun to do it that way but eventually it was accomplished.

how many hd's do you have techrepublic.com has excellent instructions for making a dual boot machine, that is what I followed that aand even toshiba's web site was very useful