boot pc from an external floppy drive

Hello,
I am would like to install a new hard drive on my notebook but the floppy drive does not work. I am thinking about buying an external hard drive for booting my system during the HD instillation process. Could any one tell me if a laptop can boot from a external floppy drive and if so is there any thing that I need to do to get the computer to boot to the usb external floppy drive?

Thanks,
Leaundrae

Thanks,
Leaundrae Shepherd