How to put an OS on a laptop with a PCMC

My friend formatted his Compaq laptop so we could put either Win 98 or NT. Well of course the driver for the PCMCIA cd-rom was wiped and we can’t install the OS. We tried using the installion disk that comes with the TEAC external cd-rom but it won’t install and comes up with an error message that says something winsetup. The next we tried was installing Win NT off disks but when it made it to the 3rd disk it cancels setup because it can’t find a cd-rom. We’re pretty new at this and we need some help.