Well I tried everything from the Compaq group on FB, including the CF-IDE adapter from Aliexpress linked there, still no luck. Can't get into the BIOS or boot - just get "missing operating system" no matter what.

I think it's time to say goodbye to this laptop 🙁

Thanks for all the info and help. I've still got nicely working LTE 5300 and Armada 7800 models that I'm currently playing with so I will continue my projects with those two 😀

I was finally able to get my 4/75CX to boot by finding a compatible floppy drive and resetting the BIOS so it could detect new HDDs, then installed MS-DOS 6.22 on the laptop directly followed by Windows 95.

djsubtronic wrote on 2022-06-13, 19:34:

I was finally able to get my 4/75CX to boot by finding a compatible floppy drive and resetting the BIOS so it could detect new HDDs, then installed MS-DOS 6.22 on the laptop directly followed by Windows 95.

I just found this thread—it's uncanny, I've had all the same issues you had (same errors and everything). Can I ask what were the BIOS changes you made? I've been trying to get Windows 95 running off of CF using this vmware method ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CtwnnqdNRY ); my floppy drive is also dead and I've been hoping to bypass it if possible.

edit—I have the original HDD, which works, so I can access setup; but the floppy drive seems pretty much toast.

Eigenschaften wrote on 2022-07-03, 03:20:

djsubtronic wrote on 2022-06-13, 19:34:

I was finally able to get my 4/75CX to boot by finding a compatible floppy drive and resetting the BIOS so it could detect new HDDs, then installed MS-DOS 6.22 on the laptop directly followed by Windows 95.

I just found this thread—it's uncanny, I've had all the same issues you had (same errors and everything). Can I ask what were the BIOS changes you made? I've been trying to get Windows 95 running off of CF using this vmware method ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CtwnnqdNRY ); my floppy drive is also dead and I've been hoping to bypass it if possible.

edit—I have the original HDD, which works, so I can access setup; but the floppy drive seems pretty much toast.

Hey - I didn't make any specific changes but I actually booted into the BIOS utilities via floppy so I was able to access it while I had the non-detectable/non-bootable CF card in the HDD bay. I simply used the "Set Defaults" option within the BIOS, and this somehow automatically updated the HDD settings, allowing the system to detect the CF. I'm not sure how you would do that with the original HDD already in the bay - you could try swapping it after booting into the BIOS but it would probably crash/hang. For my 4 GB CF card, under the "configure hard drives" option, the settings are: Drive type 65, Cylinders: 1, Heads: 16, sectors: 63, Maximum ECC: 4. It does pick up the drive as 3822.0 MB - I guess you could try those settings and see how you get on.

If this doesn't work and you are not able to find a W1D floppy drive, you can actually make it work with a similar model that I was able to find from a German eBay seller, it's a Citizen LR102061. You can use the same cable to connect it to the Elite, but it's too deep to fit in there so you will need to use it with the keyboard unscrewed (the front of the drive will extend past the edge of the laptop). Just remember to cover the drive fully in paper to insulate it from the laptop components or it can short, since the drive exterior is metal. Hopefully you can figure out HDD settings without a floppy but as a last resort if you can find a LR102061 (they definitely seem to be more readily available than the W1D), then it should be an easy fix using SP2054 softpaq to create a floppy that will let you boot into the BIOS utilities with your CF card in the bay.

hello, i have made a new post that may relate to this subject if anyone can assist or can use for reference in future. thanks
Compaq LTE Elite 4/75C (factory restore) - Compaq LTE Elite 4/75C (factory restore)

hello, i have made a new post that may relate to this subject if anyone can assist or can use for reference in future. thanks
Compaq LTE Elite 4/75C (factory restore) - Compaq LTE Elite 4/75C (factory restore)

urbanus wrote on 2019-01-09, 13:31:

Brand: Compaq Model: LTE Elite 4/75CX OS: MS-DOS 6.20 (English) & Windows 3.1 (English) […]
Show full quote

Brand: Compaq
Model: LTE Elite 4/75CX
OS: MS-DOS 6.20 (English) & Windows 3.1 (English)

Here is a backup of the MS-DOS and Windows installation.
It's a raw image of the entire hard drive, a sort of OEM restore/recovery image/backup/cd.
It contains original drivers and some branding.

Archive.org download: https://archive.org/details/compaqlteelite475cxwindows3.1.7z

Download HDD Image: https://mega.nz/#!hhNBEQLY!mZl2tRs-26X5bhiq1J … 0Wy6x4tjb-VbCSI
(Link updated 2019-07-04!)

Edit: Note that it's using a generic VGA driver!

How to change back to the factory video driver (writing this from memory):
1. Edit system.ini in the "C:\Windows" folder
2. Comment out "display=VGA.DRV"
3. Comment in the "display=..." line above the "display=VGA.DRV" line.
4. Restart

First of all I want to thank you for this forum and letting me join, it has helped me with a couple laptops.
But I have run into an issue.

I have a 4/75c and a 4/75cx
Both are using a CF-IDE adapter as well as the openflops floppy emulator.

The 4/75c has taken the image and is all working!
so I broke out the 4/75cx and followed the same procedure.
When it boots I get the curser flashing on the right to access diagnostics, but when I hit f10, it just sits there flashing on the left.
If I let it go through and it goes to boot from OS, it says no operating system.
Both drives work in the 4/75c, but neither work in the 4/75cx.

I have booted from a floppy diagnostics disk. it shows same type of hdd dectected (type 65).
But the specs ares slightly different. (cylindars, etc..)
I try to change them, but it does not.

Im starting to wonder if there is an hardware issue??

Any thoughts?

There are many issues when it comes to how an HDD is setup on these old machines.

One thing you could try is to maybe create a bootable floppy from the working 4/75c.
Then boot the 4/75cx from the floppy, and partition the HDD in the 4/75cx with "fdisk".
Now after a reboot you format C: on the 4/75cx with the command "format c: /s".
This will make it bootable and put a minimal DOS onto it.

Now take the "HDD" (CF card) out of the 4/75cx, and from a more modern PC just copy all the files from the "factory image" onto the 4/75cx HDD.
Put the HDD back in the 4/75cx, and it should boot DOS and Windows 3.1.

The trick here is to partition the HDD on the 4/75cx laptop itself with "fdisk" to avoid compatibility issues.
Then format and "install" the same DOS as the one used in the factory image.

I might look into making an alternative "install procedure" other than the HDD image.

Just FYI. The first set of 1gb cf cards from memorypartner on ebay worked fine when I bought it in 2022. I bought another set of cards in 2024 and unfortunately, these don't seem to work

I recommend sticking to 512 mb cards if possible as the bios is so finicky.

Maybe I did something different? This would explain why some of the previous members had trouble getting it to work. Just a thought