Somehow the kids managed to break my original cd-rom disk. They handed it to me one day, it was not one cd, but two halfs. I was not a happy woman that day, but thankfully because of the paranoid women I am, I made a backup shortly after I purchased Windows Xp from Futureshop. I make backups of all my cds if I have the time, and remember to. With so many kids around, anything is bound to happen. I was hoping I would never need it, but unfortunately now that I do, the backup I made isn't working. Maybe it was a bad copy, or maybe it's because I don't know enough about DOS mode to get the disk to work. It took me forever to uninstall Windows Xp Pro after Sp2 corrupted my machine, and caused many programs to malfunction. Long story shortened. Eventually I was able to reformat (I am still uncertain how, but it worked, eventually), and now when I try and install Windows XP Pro again, it gives me this message. CDR101: Not ready reading drive E Abort, Retry, Fail? I have tried a search on the net, and I have found nothing valid or helpful. Please, someone tell me what do I do to get WINDOWS XP PRO to install? I don't know why it is doing this. I don't know how to avoid this. I don't understand why I have to type E:\ when my CD-ROM is the D:\ drive. I know absolutely zilch about working in ms-dos mode. I have always had my friend perform such tasks, if need be. After neglecting my computer for months, now that I need it he is not here. He's on vacation. So I have to look elsewhere for help. I've spent days on this, and I have no idea what I am doing. At this point, maybe I should just settle for Win 98. Has anyone else been experiencing all these problems and time-consuming methods to actually get as far as I have? Am I doing something wrong? - A. Sangria

If this CD Device (CD-ROM drive/ DVD-ROM drive CD-RW drive/DVD-RW drive) in which you placed the Disc that caused the error can read/play other CDs we can conclude that there is no hardware or driver problem for the CD Device and can isolate the problem to the specific disc. Any time a CD device cannot read the files in a Disc one of the error messages displayed is CDR101, No ready .. If the problem occurs in DOS mode during setup using a startup disk with CD-ROM support and the Setup CD is scratched ot blemished in some manner you can get this error. When you use a Startuop Diskette (EX: 95/98/winMe) CD Devices will be assigned a one letter beyond their normal Windows's Drive leeter Cd-ROM drive D: become E: As I stated earlier, if the CD device's Optics are bad (Laser prob) that can also lead to this error. I would first try to take a very close scrutiny of the CD for any cracks especialy that traverses many tracks. 1.If present> you really need a new Disc:-( . If nothing very obvious is seen go to the next step. 2.Using a lint-free cloth, wipe the Disc from center to the edge in a radial manner, sector by sector (Don't due circular wipe) to remove dust/finger prints from the recorded side of the disc. If Drive is the suspect, try cleaning its Opetics by Disc Cleaning Kit or buy a new drive. M

You can not install XP from MS-DOS the same way as W9x..............see: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;307848

Well I for one am really lost here. The backup you made is what? An image file? Made in what program? Doesn't it require a rescue disk to get into the environment to restore? You can replace the XP disk in pieces from Ms if you contact them by the way. The other thing I read in here is that if SP2 destroyed your OS, the shoe is on the wrong foot. It means instead of solving all your problems before installing SP2, you intensified them by trying to fix them with SP2 and the exact opposite will happen. I would also like to know how one goes about "uninstalling XP", I have never seen this done and am curious what you mean by that. I am not being a "smartass", simpy trying to get enough information to try to solve the problem. Rich M www.kickenhardware.net