I have bought a IBM Thinkpad 560Z laptop with no operating system, just a clean hard drive. I want to load XP onto it. I have tried to boot with a win 98 boot disk, from the IBM external floppy connected to the laptop, it lights up and I can hear it trying to read the disk. However the startup screen that always comes up on the laptop,is a picture of a floppy disk, with all the F keys along the bottom, the picture of F1 pressed down, and pressing between F1 and F8 just stays in a black screen, and gives "I9990302 I9990302 I9990305" if that means anything. You can't go any further. Any idea's?

is there a keystroke that will get you into the laptop's BIOS settings? If so, once you get in there, look for a setting that will allow the laptop to boot directly from the CD drive first, then boot from your WinXP CD.

Hi could be a drive conection problem check here for those error codes and result 2nd to last on page :( http://www-3.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?lndocid=LWIK-3SR4PW&selectarea=SUPPORT&tempselected=5

http://www-3.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?lndocid=YAST-3JWKJX

This is an Old System barely meeting the minimum requirement for WinXP. I assume it has CD-ROM drive; without that you cannot install any OS other than Win95! Do you know its BIOS version? It will definetely need the latest BIOS. You need an AC adapter and a charged battery pack to Flash BIOS to the most current level. 1. After connecting the AC adapter, Shut Down the Laptop 2. Press and hold the F1 key, then turn on the computer. Hold the F1 key until the Easy-Setup menu appears. 3.If a password prompt appears, you could be in trouble!A forgotten supervisor password will prevent access to the ThinkPad BIOS setup utility. IBM says [QUOTE]"To regain access the system will need to be serviced to have the system board and hard drive replaced. Proof of purchase is required, and this repair is not covered under the warranty." [/UNQUOTE] M How To Ask Questions The Smart Way

There is NO WAY I'd try and run XP on that machine, if it will even run. I'd go for '98, or maybe at most, W2K You need to go find the "hardware maintenace manual" and the "user manual" from IBM and download them. Those manuals tell you all about Thinkpad errors

The errors simply means it can't find an operating system. Hold down the F1 key THEN power it on to enter BIOS settings. www.ibm.com has all kinds of support for the 560Z. I would definitely make sure the BIOS is updated. NO WAY would I try to run XP on this system. 98% of the population is asleep. The other 2% are staring around in complete amazement, abject terror, or both.