You can install from a flat folder and MS-DOS. If your goal is to
install Windows 2000 copy the i386 folder from the Windows 2000 CD to
the hard drive and then start the Setup with a Windows 98 Startup
diskette, that entails of course that the drive will be formated FAT32.
Make sure that you have smartdrv.exe on the W98 startup floppy.

After you copy the i386 folder to the hard disk you can then start the
Windows 2000 installation from MS-DOS by executing WINNT from the i386
folder on the hard disk.

See here for typical instructions:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315349

The instructions are for XP but it's the same thing for Windows 2000.

You can convert the file system to NTFS after the installation but make
sure that the partition is aligned to a 4K boundary or else you will end
up with 512 byte clusters. http://aumha.org/win5/a/ntfscvt.php

John

Alpha wrote:

We need to re-install Windows 98 SE or ME or 2K-Pro on a laptop that has its
CD drive internal connection damaged. The floppy drive works though.

We have all the original Windows CDs and a Win98 boot floppy, as well as all
the required drivers. The unit originally had Win98 on it that was later
upgraded to WinME and subsequently to Win2K-Pro.

Can we - take out the hard drive and format it (using appropriate existing
adapters) in FAT on another machine and -
copy the CD contents and device drivers to an install folder, and -
put that drive back into the laptop, and -
boot with the Win98 floppy, and -
run Setup from the install folder, bypassing the CD drive?

Somebody says this can be done but I wanted to hear from the learned folks
here first before proceeding.

Regards and TIA

Alpha
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