One of my former neighbos had asked me to figure out what was wrong with his Satellite Pro 430CDT/1.3 laptop. I took it home with me and booted up the machine.
Every time I boot up the machine I get the same message , “Invalid system disk. Replace the disk, and then press any key.”
I have tried everything I know how to do. I’ve tinckered with the Bios and tried to install several times.
I know with my machines viruse software if I have a floppy in the drive when I boot up I get the same message unless it’s a boot disk. However this machine does not have a floppy drive. My neighbor was using an external floppy drive which he doesn’t have anymore. I’m wondering if thats why I can’t get any further with this laptop.
Any suggestions would be a great help. I don’t really want to have to junk this machine concidering that I love to make old machoines tick…
You could try changing the boot order in the BIOS. Its probably trying to look to A: for its OS instead of the hard disk.
The 430CDT is not looking for a floppy, it will default to the hard disk if no floppy is found and the hard disk is evidently damaged or the boot sector is wiped. Without a floppy your re-install options are limited.
The hard drive easily removes from the underside of the machine after releasing a screw (flip it upside down and look) . A $ 10.00 adapter that will let you slave the laptop drive to a desktop master and format the 2.5" laptop disk. I am assuming you are putting Win 95 or Win 98 on the machine as it is a P-120 and really does not have the horsepower to run anything beyond that very efficiently. It would be probably happiest with Win 95 version B. Your best bet would be to put the CD install binaries in a C:\win95 or C:\win98 directory and install directly off the hard disk.
You can get a floppy for $ 36.00