I have an Asus 900hd netbook that I just bought from someone a couple weeks ago. I somehow managed to get a virus on it and I don't have an external CD drive to reinstall the OS so I figured I would TRY putting the OS on a USB FLASH drive and installing it off of there with the USB as a bootable device. So I changed the boot sequence to boot the removable device(USB) as the first priority. After doing that I restarted my netbook and it shows the BIOS like its about to boot but then I just get a black screen with a little white line at the top then it doesn't boot at all, just a black screen. So I tried changing the boot sequence back to its original state, with the HDD first but I still get the black screen >.< The OS currently on it is windows xp home edition, and the one I'm trying to put on it is windows xp corporate edition Trying to to get Windows XP  install to boot from a USB is hard.
Don't yup have a friend that will loan you an external CD drive?
Do you have a Desktop PC with a CD-drive...
 that will volunteer to be externalized?
OR
You can get a good one for under  $50 in the USA.
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/category/category_slc.asp?CatId=483&Nav=|c:89|&Sort=3&Recs=10&SRCCODE=WEBGOOCDVD&cm_mmc_o=mH4CjC7BBTkwCjCECjCE

(I do not endorse Tiger Direct. The link is for informational purpose.)

Thee are articles on the MS website that tell how to install NT and similar version of Windows without a CD drive.
OR

How to install Windows without a CD drive 
- Google search results
Hope this is of some help.Thanks for the reply  unfortunately I don't know anyone with an external cd drive......and I've tried almost every method of installing from USB and none of them work =( My desktop motherboard fried a couple months ago but I still have the CD drive, I wasn't aware that they can be externalized. How would I go about doing that? Can I use it by itself or do I need a WORKING desktop?Yes, you can externalize a working CD-Drive.
it needs two things.
A small power supply that provides 5 and 12 volts
Ana adapter that will convert IDE / SATA to USB.


USB to IDE Converter Adapter power - eBay.com

These are cheap, but if you are careful they will do the job. DO NOT plug  in or out with the power on. They  not 'hot SWAP', you can damage a drive or theadapter. Only the USB is fool proof.

I have ruined about three adopters and one drive.
Quote from: Geek-9pm on August 07, 2010, 05:10:34 PM

I have ruined about three adopters and one drive.

Early adopters?