A netbook can be very convenient due to its lightness and small size. However, due to the fact that netbooks are not equipped with an integrated optical drive, performing certain tasks (for example, reinstalling the OS) may be difficult. If you do not have a spare external CD drive, the installation of a new OS can be done using a bootable USB flash drive.
If you decide to check how to install Windows on a netbook, you will need a bootable USB flash drive (with a capacity of 2 GB or 4 GB), which you need to prepare by downloading the ISO image of the OS you want to install from the Internet.
Then you can proceed directly to the installation process. The guide below will tell you how to install Windows XP on a netbook (Windows 7 may cause some difficulties due to the specifics of the setup).
Insert your bootable USB flash drive into one of the USB ports on your netbook. Turn on the computer and press the "F9" key to open the boot device selection window. This key may be called "Fn" in devices of some models. Select your flash drive as the initial download source.
Remember to delete all partitions on your hard drive. Of course, you can simply create separate partitions, but this is not recommended. This can cause various system errors to appear at boot time. Create one large NTFS partition (quick creation will save you a lot of time) and follow the guides that will appear on the screen in sequence. These instructions will tell you how to install Windows on a netbook.
Several times during the installation process, the system will prompt you to restart the computer. If you try to do this, it will start to boot again from the hard drive and you will receive an error message. To avoid this, you need to press "F9" at reboot and select option "1" to configure the graphical interface. Speaking about how to install Windows 7 on a netbook, it should be noted some specificity of this version of the OS, so this method may not work.
Once you finish installing XP, you may notice that you cannot boot Windows from your hard drive. If you still have a USB drive, press "F9" again and select the "GUI" option. After that, the OS should boot, and the question of how to install Windows on a netbook will be resolved.
If booting from the hard drive is still not possible, you should edit the boot.ini file:
Type MSCONFIG in the Run window located on the Start menu and select the BOOT.INI tab. Try the option "Check all boot paths." This can solve your problem by finding and removing the wrong boot settings.
Manually editing the boot.ini file may also be necessary if it does not read something like multi (o) disk (0) rdisk (o) partition. Most likely, the problem is that the wrong section is selected. It may display as (0), (2) or something like this. In this case, back up and then edit the file.
Open System Properties by right-clicking on the My Computer menu and selecting Properties. Alternatively, you can type "sysdm.cpl" in the Run window located on the Start menu. Go to the "Download and Restore" tab, then click on the button labeled "Edit" to open your boot.ini file in notepad. It’s a good idea to keep the backup — just select “Save As” and save the file in a place convenient for you.
Now you can safely edit the boot.ini file, change the number of partitions or adjust other parameters. Save the changes to a file, after which you can load the installed OS after rebooting the system without your USB flash drive. Thus, understanding how to install Windows on a netbook is not so difficult.