Invalid partition table

[sweevo]

I've been given a computer by a friend to fix and I don't know what to do.

From what I know it had XP on it, and something happened to need it re-installing. Somewhere along the line the drive was reformatted, but when I now try to install Windows I run into problems.

The computer has no floppy drive, and when I try to boot it from CD (I've tried XP and Win 98 CDs), I just get an "invalid partition table" error and nothing else happens.

I don't know specs of the system as I write this, but could get them if required.

Could anyone shed any light on the situation?

Thanks.

 

[BuckeyeComputers]

Check your bios for boot options and make sure that boot from cdrom is ahead of the harddrive, also when booting with the xp cd remember that you have to press any key to boot from cd