XP Booting off CD trouble

had same problem with loading win xp proff on cf 74 toughbook mk1.
soution for me was downloading sata hdd controller from panasonic toughbook support site, loading the driver onto floppy drive, using usb floppy with driver ready to use, loading win xp profesional and on first loading win screen pressing f6 when prompted at beginning of win intallation, when on screen instructions to load sata driver appeared, i followed on screen instructions and loaded 3rd option from floppy sata drive mobile driver, left usb installed untill xp loaded and running, do not remove usb floppy untill win loaded, i really hope this helps you

try to boot into safe mode with a lower resolution screen

the hardrive has failed take it out and have it checked or replace

I think your actually having issues getting it to run on the toughbook because it uses different drivers for everything from the Acer computer. If you press F8 while booting up you can choose the option "Disable automatic restart (of system errors or something)". Then when the machine boots up you should get a blue screen giving you an error code like "IRQ_EQUAL_TO_OR_GREATER_X Error: 0x0000005f. You could try to see what the message is trying to tell you to resolve it but the error msg would likely point to the driver that its trying to load that's most likely different from the toughbook you have. I'd suggest getting an external cdrom/dvdrom and install windows from a disc onto the toughbooks hd while its in that toughbook machine.

XP can not be installed from usb as the bios does not enable it. Plug the ide hard drive into an older desktop system and install from boot on cd. Once all files are copied over then you need to copy the i386 folder over from the cd. Reinstall the hard drive into the toughbook and carry on the install from there.

Please refer to this Link

You could attempt to boot to safe mode, and run the Start> System Recovery > PC Recovery Application.

Otherwise, I'd boot to safe mode, select start, run, type: msconfig, select the startup tab, remove any unwanted startup items that may be causing the system crash.

Hope this helps.

You'll need to reformat the drive as NTFS
______

It could be your HDD or DVD drive problem.

Try low level format your HDD and re-install XP again.

If it still problem come again then try clean the laser unit of the DVD drive or replaced another one if you can.

The command.com is a key file in the booting up process of computers. You either have a virus that destroyed it, or your hard disk drive is failing. Try going into the CMOS and make sure the CD is listed in the boot order and first, then boot to system CD.