Laptops :: Installing Without Bootable CDROM or Floppy

I used this to install DSL on my Toshiba Tecra 5100CDT. I did not have the external floppy drive, and the internal CD-ROM does not boot. I had Windows 98 installed on the harddisk. This is how I coaxed DSL into booting from the CD. It should work on most other systems.

Step 1: Download loadlin (http://elserv.ffm.fgan.de/~lermen/) and place it into your "C:\Windows" directory. This utility boots Linux from a DOS command line. It works under Windows 95/98. I do not know about ME. For Windows NT-based systems, look into Grub for NT.

Step 2: Copy the files "linux24" and "minirt24.gz" to a folder on your harddisk from the "\boot\isolinux" folder on the CD.

Step 3: Reboot into MS-DOS mode and "cd" into the directory containing the files you copied from the cd.

Step 4: Insert the Damnsmall CD into the drive. Then, at the command line, enter the command "loadlin linux24 initrd=minirt24.gz"

This should boot the CD. You can now begin a harddisk install.

original here.