booting a tp570 from a pcmcia-card CD

[william]

I've got a ThinkPad 570 I'm trying to fix for a friend. It's got a pcmcia-card CD, but no floppy.

Apparently, there's no OS on the hd - all I get on boot is "Operating System not found". Even though I've got the BIOS set to boot from CD, then the hd, it won't boot from the CD. (I've tried Win98, 2000 and Ubuntu Linux - no joy with any of them.)

Will the 570 boot from a pcmcia-card CD, or do I need a boot floppy and floppy drive? If I get an ultrabase w/CD, will it boot from that?

[william]

Well, I'll find out in a few days. The owner agreed to pay me for any hardware expenses, so I ordered an ultrabase with both floppy and CD on eBay. Should be here Wednesday, or so UPS claims. Further updates as they happen.

[whizkid]

It will most certainly boot from either floppy or CD in the UltraBase. Booting from the PC Card CD could be impossible. External floppy works too.

[william]

Got the ultrabase today (OK, yesterday, looking at the clock). Works like a champ - snapped the 570 onto it, plugged it in, put the Ubuntu disk in the CD & off it goes.

I'd swear that somewhere in the last week I'd read that the ultrabase had an ethernet jack, but it appears that I either miss-read or miss-remembered - no ethernet. I've got a couple of pcmcia ethernet cards, but they don't seem to want to connect. That's another post, for the linux sub-form, though.

Bottom line: got it, it works, life is good. Haven't tried the floppy, and I'll probably suggest to the owner that he remove it an put an extra battery in its place.