Booting from an External CD drive

Anyone ever have any trouble booting from an external CD drive? I'd like to boot a WinXP CD (a version I found online called "MiniXP") and I have an external CD drive, it's a bit old, but it seems to work with Ubuntu. Problem is I can't boot from it right now. I have a Xubuntu CD in the drive right now (I haven't prepared the MiniXP CD), which I know works. I've booted this Xubuntu CD from various Windows laptops and computers before. When I go to the BIOS setup, and select the "Boot" option, I can see a "USB CDROM:" in the Boot options. I moved this "USB CDROM:" to the top of the Boot list, assuming it would boot first: nothing happened. Another thing I tried to do was press F12 and select which Drive to boot from, but it only shows me the SSD drive and the Network boot, no "USB CDROM:", what gives?

The CD drive in question is an HP CD-Writer 8200 series

 

BIOS should show USB CDROM: followed by the drive identification string when the drive is recognized correctly. Since the drive name seems to be missing I would make sure that the drive is working properly on another computer.

 

Yeah, I don't think the drive is working properly. I've tried a couple of other things tonight and it doesn't seem like it is. I can use it to open CD-ROMS in Ubuntu, but it won't boot from this laptop either. So it seems like it can read CDs fine within an OS but BIOS doesn't detect it for some reason. This is as far as my knowledge goes...

 

I have this prob all the time
Try plugging it in, pressing F2 to go to bios setup, then press f10 to save (dont need to make any changes) then press enter
Now press f12 while booting and it will probably be detected.
It's the only way I can ever get my drive recognised in bios
Rory

 

Tried this twice, but it still won't work. Thanks for the tip though.

 

the drive must be compatible with el-torito standard. if your drive is a bit old it may not support it...
check the specific model/manufacturer documentation...
also, I came across old gen drives that were incompatible with certain brands of media. you may want to test with different types of CDs. Drives are picky with CDRWs too..

 

Thanks. The drive is more than a bit old, it's really old. I got it as a hand-me down from my Grandfather a long time ago. I checked the Product specs online and no mention of "el-torito standard", doesn't seem to be compatible. http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&docname=lpg40280

 

Daft as it may be try using a different USB cable. My (new)DVD writer works perfectly with certain cables with the netbook but others it will only work with after boot up.... Daft but hey thats life...

regards
Andrew

 

actually, a very good point ^
if it is very old, it may need more power than the standard ones.
if you have a Y USB cable, try plugging in to 2 ports instead of just one.

 

Does the fact that it has its own power source change anything?

 

yeah kinda does, it should be getting enough power as it is then..
still would give it a go with a different usb cable though.

 

nope mie has own power cable....

 

I tried a different USB cable and it didn't recognize the usb external cd drive during BIOS.
Thanks for the tip though.

 

sorry man, unless on the HP website there is a firmware update for your drive, i guess you're out of luck..