Unlocking a Dell laptop

I'm finding that my 1150 Inspiron Dell laptop is alot like a cell phone-it's locked! Doesn't matter what Windows XP CD I put in the drive, I can't get it to read it, unless it was the one that was issued with the laptop (The Dell one). Unfortunately I can't find that CD...anyway, it's XP Home, and I have an XP Pro that I want to put on it.

Is there any way that I can "unlock" the Dell laptop so that it will read a non-Dell manufactured Win. XP cd? I've tried booting from the CD, nothing, and just putting the CD in the drive doesn't yield anything. Mind you if I put the original CD in I'm find, something pops up and I work from there.

Any ideas?

Dan

 

Ya, but is there any fancy program that I can install to get rid of that problem?