Question : Reistalling windows on a laptop with no internal drives

i have the sony x505. this laptop has no internal cd drives and no floppy drive also.
i'm having issues with the computer not loading windows so i must do a fresh windows install.
the laptop only has usb 2.0 ports, firewire, and pc card slot. i purchased an external dvdr drive
but the computer doesnt recognize it during POST probably because it cant load the drivers.
i also purchased external floppy but the computer does boot to it either. i'm checked the bios for
usb boot options but i could not find any. only boot options i found were
- Optical Drive
- Floppy Drive
- Hard Drive
- Network
you move those options up and down the list to get the devices to load from top of the list to bottom
now since the computer has no internal drives whatsoever i assumed that the above option are for
external devices but none of them seem to work. is there any way to reinstall windows? help please.

Answer : Reistalling windows on a laptop with no internal drives

I can't remember if the administrators group has automatic rights to join computers to the domain, but I believe it does.  Anyhow, lets do it anyway to make sure.  Go to 'start', 'administrative tools', 'Active Directory Users and Computers'.  Right click on your domain (example yourdomain.com) and select 'Delegate control'.   Click next, then 'Add'.  Click 'Advanced' then 'Find now'.  Double click the 'Administrators' group.   Then click 'OK'.  Click 'next'.  Select the box 'Join computers to domain'.  You should now be able to join your laptop to the domain.  

How DHCP is normally setup is as follows:
In administrative tools folder, select the 'Configure your server' wizard.  Select DHCP, click 'next', insert CD, click 'next'.  The New Scope Wizard pops up.  Enter name and description.  Click next.  Enter start and end range for clients address range.  For example, if your subnet is 192.168.1.0 and mask is 255.255.255.0 (AKA /24 network), you might enter 192.168.1.100 as the start  and 192.168.1.200 as the end.  It really depends on how many clients you anticipate on your network.  The length must be 24 the mask will be 255.255.255.0.  Click next.  You can ignore exclusions, because you can use addresses 192.168.1.3-192.168.1.99 if you must statically configure other computers.  Click next.  Client lease is fine at 8 days.  Click next.  Select 'yes I want to configure these options now'.  Click next.  Enter IP of your router in default gateway.  Click next.  In 'parent domain', use the domain name you used to configure Active Directory and DNS.  (yourdomain.com).  Type in the name of the server in 'Server name', then click 'Resolve'.  If it doesn't resolve, DNS isn't set up properly.  If it does, click 'Add' next to IP address.  Click next.  Ignore WINS.  Click next.  'Yes I want to activate this scope'.  Cilck next.  Finished.  This is how to install a basic DHCP server.  

As you may have found out, when you install Active Directory, it prompts you to install DNS.  Open the DNS applet (in administrative tools folder), and make sure there is an entry for your computer.
To setup DNS properly, in your server TCP/IP network adapter properties, you should statically configure your server info.  You could use 192.168.1.2 with a mask of 255.255.255.0.   The DNS server entry points to itself 192.168.1.2 and the default gateway will be your router (192.168.1.1) assuming that's the router IP.  You may currently have 'obtain ip address automatically set on your adapter', but if you don't have DHCP setup on your server, it may try to pull the TCP/IP info from your router if you have DHCP setup and running on it.  Disable DHCP on router, as it may interfere with the client trying to access RIS.  

There should be a host, NS, and SOA record for your computer in DNS.   It is listed in 'Forward Zones', 'yourdomain.com'.  After you click on 'yourdomain.com' it should list the entries on the right.  If you didn't statically configure your adapter, you must edit these records manually with the static IP address.

If you have any other questions, don't hesitate to ask!