It is likely that your motherboard is set up to boot from (in order)
floppy
CD
Hard disk
This means you can just pop the CD in and reboot and you should be able to skip
the rest of this section.
In the event that your computer does not attempt to boot from the CD, you may
need to change the boot order in your BIOS.
- here is how you change those settings
During a hard boot (when the machine is first turned on or when the reset button
has been pressed) try these - getting the right time can be tricky
and I tend to press the combination or key about every 2 seconds to ensure
entering the CMOS/BIOS
Entering CMOS For Different Motherboards
Press Tab during boot = Emachine
Press DEL during boot = (AMI, Award)
PPress Esc during boot = Toshiba)
Press F1 during boot = (Toshiba; Phoenix; Late model PS/1 Value Point and 330s)
Press F2 during boot = (NEC)
Press F10 when square in top RH corner of screen = (Compaq)
Press Ins during boot=IBM PS/2 with reference partition
Shift Ctrl Alt + Num Pad del = Olivetti PC Pro
Ctrl Alt ? = some PS/2s, such as 75 and 90
Ctrl-Esc = Misc Puters
Ctrl Ins = some PS/2s when pointer at top right of screen
Press reset twice = some Dells
Ctrl Alt Enter = Dell
Ctrl Alt Esc = AST Advantage, Award, Tandon
Ctrl Alt + = Misc Puters
Ctrl Alt S = Phoenix
Ctrl Alt Ins = (Zenith, Phoenix)
Ctrl S = (Phoenix)
Ctrl Shift Esc = Tandon 386
while you are in CMOS check whether there is an "USB legacy device support" option. Major boards require this activated else they don't boot off a USB-stick. If you can already boot nicely w/o it, leave it off, since it has minor disadvantages such as "USB harddisks" showing up duplicated in Windows ME Explorer for example.
many motherboards support F11 to enter the boot device menu, allowing for quickly boot off USB-stick, then next time harddisk w/o bother with CMOS at all.
There's also a page with different computers and how to access the BIOS available here∞.
