Thanks for your help.

You asked: Upgrade from what to what?
I'm using the XP Upgrade CD simply because I do not have the plain XP
CD. I have the ME. I upgraded from ME. I've read...over and over
again...that I can reformat the hard drive using the XP Upgrade CD only.
(Although, I will need the ME CD to verify that I have the right to use it.)

Basically, it's my old computer that was running so slow it was driving my
whole family crazy. Fortunately, my wonderful son bought me a brand new
computer for Mother's day. So, I'm finally getting around to formatting the
hard drive on the old computer. I just want to format the hard drive to get
rid of everything, then reinstall XP on it.

Thank you for telling me how to check to see if the computer is really
booting off the CD. I've never needed to do this when I have formatted
drives in the past, so I didn't realize that I could check that. I'll check
it tomorrow when I'm working on it.

I can't believe how long this is taking me. I thought it was a "simple" -
format the hard drive and reinstall everything just as I've done in the past.

Thanks again for your help!


"Jim" wrote:

>
> "Grace" <Grace@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:003977EB-21C2-4AAF-BE59-BB320CFFC710@microsoft.com...
> >I have tried to format the hard drive of my old computer using my XP Home
> > Upgrade CD. I've read that this will work. However, when I try it, it
> > states that:
> >
> > Setup cannot continue because there is a newer version on this computer
> > than
> > is on this disk.
> >
> > I'm guessing, of course, that the "newer" version it is speaking of is SP1
> > and SP2.
> >
> > Can anyone tell me how to get that hard drive formatted? I've tried the
> > boot disks that Microsoft offers, after changing the BIOS to Floppy, of
> > course.
> > (That unfortunately didn't work, possibly due to the fact that the old
> > computer
> > has a newer microsoft keyboard that the boot disks won't recognize.)
> > {After
> > paying almost $10 for 10 floppies! Because no-one carries floppies
> > anymore.
> > This is just to let you know the floppies were brand new that I made
> > the boot
> > disks from, in case that matters.}
> >
> > I've tried using the XP Home Upgrade CD (as mentioned above), after
> > changing
> > the BIOS to cdrom.
> >
> > (I do have my ME disk, if necessary.)
> >
> >
> Upgrade from what to what?
>
> The best explanation I have is that the CD is not bootable. The computer
> would then boot from the hard drive.
> To check this possibility, press Start. Enter cmd in the run box. When you
> see the dos-like screen, enter:
> SET.
>
> This will display all of the environment variables, and the one you want to
> look for is the location of the boot drive.
> If this disk is C, then the cd is not bootable, and you are asking XP to
> commit suicide, which it will not do.
> Jim
>
>
>