Unable to boot xp iso on physical machines

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    I am attempting to reinstall windows xp on a dell dimension 4600 system. The hdd is running an ubuntu server but that shouldn't affect anything

    I have tried this with two separate windows XP iso files. Both work on a vm but neither work on any physical computer that I have tested (thinkpad laptop and the dimension system]). (ISO 1, ISO 2). I have successfully booted both computers into a linux distro so no problems there, it is specifically these two XP iso files. Another thing that confuses me is the fact that the iso boots perfectly normal on a vm. Are there iso files that are modified to only boot on these virtual machines? If you have any idea what could be going on I would love to hear some feedback.

    Extra notes:
    Dimension gives me a "strike f1 to retry boot, f2 for setup utility" <-- this is usually an error that is thrown when there are no detected bootable storage devices. Only does this when attempting to boot on the XP iso as stated above.

    Thinkpad laptop straight up just refuses to boot and reverts back to the boot menu.

    (Both iso files are 32 bit)

    • Best Answer

    if you are trying to install the ISO using a USB drive, then I'm afraid it's not going to work. You cannot install Windows XP from a USB drive without modifying the image. However, you can burn the image to a CD and then install it that way.

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  • wild1145 November 2, 2022 at 6:41 PM

    Selected a post as the best answer.