I used my windows restore windows xp disk from my desk laptop to load on my sons laptop because when bought it it had no os. It worked then now won'/t boot up it goes as far as the windows screen and then to blue screen unmountable boot volume. I tried to put the disk back in and go on to recovery console but wont let me run chkdsk. it says specified disk not valid or no disk in disk drive. I also get the message partitional (unknown) error occured cannot setup. I typed help for other commands and under map it says ? 6190mb\device\hardware\partional1 and under that it says D: \device\cd rom. When I typed d: I was able to run chkdsk and it says the volume serial number is 05d4-69a7 and under diskpart says partional 1 (unknown, under d: dir it sayd volume in device xp_home_sp2. I don't know if it was smart but I used my driver and utilities cd from my dell desktop and it was able to show windows 98 and load the drivers and then said a ramdisk boot goes with c: for dell setup options. when I scandisk with this disc it said drive d and c were fine. It seem I am able to do alot I'/m just wondering if there is a way to fix this. -

You can't use your restore disk on your sons computer. Your sons Laptop may have a restore partition on the hard drive that will allow you to restore THAT laptop to factory state. If not then: You need to buy a copy of whatever operating system you want and can run on the computer.

The only partition showing is the unknown one or is there another place to fined if theres an original one . I looked on ebay and all the operating systems are so expensive I did find linux would that work on his laptop and his laptop only has a cd rom drive do you know if these are floppys or cd and if there floppys can I buy an external floppy drive to load into his laptop

The unknown may well be a restore partition. What you need to do is download a manual for the exact model of the laptop. The manual can explain the restore process. That varies widely from model to model. What brand an model is the laptop?

Information was provided in your first post here: http://www.computing.net/answers/wi... There is also this post: http://www.computing.net/answers/wi... Perhaps you didn't read those responses saying what you were trying to do wouldn't work and to buy a valid Windows XP CD and license. "So won’t you give this man his wings What a shame To have to beg you to see We’re not all the same What a shame" - Shinedown