Dell OEM XP Slipstream

[tslug]

Thanks, so yeah, I tried using the dell.img from isobuster, now I've got new cool symptoms identical to this thread: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?act=ST&f=89&t=39005 Hooray! I'll see if I can use that thread to help my progress.

I guess the good news is it no longer asks me to activate!

[tslug]

Well I used ISO Buster to rip both dell.img and the rest of the data from the CD to make sure I was starting from scratch and not using slipstreamed data. I burned a bootable CD using Roxio with the dell.img file, No Emulation, Load Segment 0x7c0 and a Sector Count of 4.

No more errors like above, but I still get prompted for activation. At this point I'm really lost. Using the dell.img boot sector and the unmodified data directly from the CD, what else is there that could be affecting this?

I notice dell.img and boot.cat files on the Dell CD. I can rip them both, but when Roxio asks me for the image I select dell.img and it creates boot.cat for me. Should I be doing this differently? The only error I get when creating the CD is about the CD being over 8 levels deep, and some computers not being able to read this. Nothing I can do about that, though, right?

[tslug]

BTW, if I try to activate, it tells me that I'm using an unauthorized product key, even though I didn't enter a product key and Dell's disc just uses the one that's included. I can always type in the one on the side of the box, but there should be a way that this will all work, isn't there?

[JoeMSFN]

I've never had any luck "Activating" using the code on the "untouched" Dell CD's winnt.sif file. I've had astoundingly good success (as in perfect) using the code on the sticker.

@[whoever posted the info for extracting the BOOT INFO from the Dell CD]

I've never been able to successfully extract the boot info from a MS CD and use it to make a bootable cd, so I've been using the boot info from XPCreate (back when Greenmachine distributed a boot image).

Since I have an ISO of a Dell install CD, I guess I'll try again to get it working and test it when I get another Dell to work on.

I never would have thought the difference for the "bios pre-activation" would be in the boot part of the CD, I just assumed it was in the actual files in i386 or some of those files in the root of the CD.

[BuckoA51]

Quick question, are you slipstreaming a generic OEM cd or are you using a DELL OEM cd as the basis and slipstreaming that?

[ILuvSnakMachines]

If you're still having problems with activation PM me, I can fix it for you.

[spiritpyre]

I ran into some problems with my dell oem -> UA cd as well. Never used nlite but i wasn't able to slipstream it manually (errors @ missing files on booting) so here's what I did that worked:

- took another (not dell) oem cd from another machine that already had sp2 slipstreamed and replaced the winnt.sif

- followed these unattended instructions for activation (specifically the "OEMBIOS.BIN Method")

and ever since that point I haven't had any problems with it

[tslug]

Thanks for all the tips guys. Not sure why I didn't get emailed when you posted a response. I'll try all these suggestions. BTW, yes, I'm using Dell XP CD direct from Dell.

Thanks,

tslugmo