Unable To Boot From USB or CD Rom...device is seemingly not recognized

[muk]

I have an old Dell Latitude L400. When booting, it goes past the Dell logo then stops at the 'logging in options' with Safe mode, last known and so on. I do not have an Internal CD ROM although I have an external CD Rom, and Booting from removal devices is an option in the bios. However, when I attempt to boot from any source (The bootable USB OS...win 2000, or the external CD ROM) it keeps coming up with the same logging options after the dell screen...almost as if it didn't recognize the other devices. Help!

[Elmar]

when I attempt to boot from any source (The bootable USB OS...win 2000, or the external CD ROM)

do you mean windows 2000 is on the usb drive?

elmar

[muk]

Hi Elmar,
Yes it is. I searched and found out how to create a bootable usb with win 2000. I used the same procedure to create a win 7 for my other laptop which worked so I ruled out the usb being an issue

[Elmar]

when always the same screen comes up, regardless what boot option you try to use, then i would say, the other boot options are not used.

what exactly have you done when you try to boot from usb or from the external cd rom drive?