I am having trouble installing XP to my USB hardrive, I have used many different techniques including Norton Ghost but failed. All I want to do is connect my USB hardrive to the motherboard via some sort of IDE converter so I can install XP and afterwards and use the USB hardrive externally on any computer I connect to. Can this be done and do these types of converters exist?
I understand that XP will be pissed off at me but I don?t mind if XP needs to scan new hardware every time I connect to a new computer. I just need to know why my ghost image didn?t work or weather I can connect my external hardrive to the motherboard through IDE connection.
Please note that the ghost image starts to load windows and just before I get to the welcome menu BANG the dreaded blue screen pops up and the computer shuts down.
what you are trying to do won't work unless motherboards' chipsets are the same as either xp will barf or get the blue screen of death. is your usb port & external drive usb2?
I?ve checked everything, my USB slot and hardrive are both USB2. Can you maybe suggest why my ghosting (hardrive copying) didn?t work? Is it conflicting with my internal hardrive settings or does that not matter as I set my USB to boot first. I just want XP on my external Hardrive, any help please?
From a quick bit of research on Google, it appears you CAN do what you're trying partially. I think your primary problem is that your external HDD is still known by the system as drive D: or something else, not C: . So once the Ghost'ed image gets to some reference that a file is on the internal drive, bang goes Windows on the boot. And, like the moderator said, your XP install is tied to the hardware of the PC it was first installed on, referencing the chipsets, serial numbers, blah blah, so you will not be able to take your external hard drive to another computer and boot up your install.
Anyway, take a look at these two sites for further information on making an external HDD (or USB stick) the primary boot device or a backup of your internal one in case it fails:
Hope this helps. (And if you try it, do note the instructions about unplugging all the other HDDs so that your external is recognized by the hardware as drive C: ).
