Bios won't boot to CD or Floppy!!!

Hi! I'm working on a Gateway Solo 9550 that refuses to boot from either cd or floppy. I have the bios set to boot from cd first, then external source. I tried to flash the bios from a floppy and I get a remove device error, once I remove the floppy it boots to windows normally. How can I get around this? The cd drive and floppy work fine from within windows. Is there a way to flash the bios from a usb drive? Should I try uninstalling the cdrw drive? I wish to do a repair or reinstall but can't boot from cd.:confused

 

Set it to boot from the floppy drive first. And make sure you have a bootable floppy disk.

E

 

I tried that, it demands I remove the device when i reboot. what do you mean by bootable?

 

I shudder at the thought of ever needing a floppy disk. This link might help you a little. http://www.computerhope.com/boot.

This link may work better. http://www.computerhope.com/boot.htm

E

 

agh, yes I do! I have a failed vista install (it was installed from within XP) . Im trying to revert back to xp or repair from the vista cd, but thats not possible, and ofcourse I can't boot from any cd so this is not good. I went to the Gateway site and downloaded a bios update to install to the floppy, but that didn't work either! Even UBCD4Win cd didn't boot! Weird, the drives work fine once vista is loaded. I'll try creating another boot floppy, I wonder if theres a vista boot floppy someplace???? What command from the boot disk might work? fixmbr?

 

Here's how to create a 2 floppy boot set for Vist from within Vista
http://www.multibooters.co.uk/floppy.html