[flub]

I have this problem and was wondering if someone here would be so kind as to help or point me in the right direction.

Problem
My old laptop hard disk died and it's not worth repairing/replacing the disk although the screen, keyboard and wireless cards are all fine.

I wanted to try and use this Laptop as a dumb terminal that would simply somehow run Remote Desktop from a CD or USB stick or whatever method is best onto my Main PC which is housed up stairs.

This means I could access my Main PC anywhere in the house via the dumb terminal.

Any thoughts about how I could do this.

Some points of note:
1) The Laptop Bios does not allow to boot from USB
2) I tried running UBUNTU Live CD but it still appears to want to write something the HDD and fails

Would love any readers thoughts/comments.

[Squashman]

Do you know how easy and cheap it is to replace a hard drive, whether it be a desktop or laptop. I would just replace the Hard Drive.

Linux Live CD's do not need a HD to run. You should be able to run just about any of them. Some of them have a Remote Desktop Client that can access the Remote Desktop Host on XP Pro.

If you have an XP install CD you could also create a Bart PE boot disk. This is basically just windows that boots from a CD. It is a live Windows CD just like a Live Linux CD.

What is the make and model of the laptop. We can probably point in the right direction for a replacement Hard Drive.