I began an install of W2K on a 1998 IBM Thinkpad [vintage 1998]. I believe it reached the point where the system had to reboot for the first time. When the screen appeared looking more like W2K than DOS, an error message displayed, which said something about the Install program being unable to find 'GLOBALROOT\DEVICE\CDROM0\i386\NT5INF.CAT', together with some reference to Service Pack 3. Although the reboot was to the hard disk, the install CD, which was Service Pack 3, was still in the drive. I have used this CD successfully to install to another machine [desktop]. Does anyone know what the problem is and how to correct? Thanks.

It could be bad sectors on the hd if it's the original drive from 1998. Try running a chkdsk on it or replacing it altogether.

I had the same problem re-installing from an integrated SP4 CD. It happened when I tried to bundle the drivers for one of my PCI cards onto the installation (unattended install). If you're doing that then Win2K might need to be reminded that your CD exists (using winnt.sif). From your post I don't think it's that so try looking here: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=228852 If you're not using a custom install CD (like me), then it's probably that your CD drive isn't responding fast enough and the Win2K installer thinks it isn't there. Try replacing the drive (you can get one for 10 units of western money (eur, usd, gbp)), it probably needs replacing anyway. You could exchange it for a DVD-R!