Can`t boot up/Reinstall Win98??

[art miller]

I`ll run this by you again.

I can`t boot up. Get `Invalid system disc etc.`
But NO disc in PC.

F8 and CTRL won`t work
Can`t get Safe Mode.
System disc and manufacturer`s boot disc can`t get by error.

If I reinstall Win98 will I lose all my data?

How do I reinstall? Not done it before. Is this the only solution as nothing else works?

Anything you can offer greatly appreciated, Art

 

[brianF]

previous thread for reference
http://forums.techguy.org/showthread.php?threadid=63346

 

[rugrat]

A couple of things to try first. We need to find out if it is a bad Floppy drive or HDD drive. Try unplugging your floppy cable and floppy power cable, then boot.

If you still get the same error, plug the floppy back in and unplug the cable and power to your hard drive and boot with your floppy system disk and see if you can get to the A: prompt.

Post back and let us know.

SeeYa

 

[brianF]

When you where in your bios did you check to make sure your hard drive was configured correctly??? Cylinders, heads, etc right and showing full capacity.

Have you tried reinserting the cables from the hard drive to motherboard, try a new cable, make sure jumper has not come loose from hard drive or another device attached on same cable.

 

[art miller]

Thanks Brian and Rugrat,

Disconnect A drive??

Check he BIOS??

Talk me through it -- I`m lost.

But hue thanks, Art

 

[rugrat]

In order to unhook the floppy, unplug the computer from the wall and ensure it if off, Open the case and look for the back of the floppy drive (ANYTIME YOU ARE IN THE CASE YOU MUST KEEP YOURSELF GROUNDED BY TOUCHING A METAL PART OF THE CASE!)
On the back of the drive will be a ribbon cably and a power connector, unplug both of them from the drive. The ribbon cable will have a red stripe on one edge, make a note which side that stripe is on as you must put it back on the same way. Once this is done, try to boot your computer and let us know what happens.

The procedure for the hard drive is the same, you will have to hook the floppy back up before unhooking the hard drive. While you have it open, check to see that the ribbon cables are firmly seated in the motherboard.

Let us know

 

[art miller]

Thanks, Rugrat,

I`ll try your suggestion.

PC repair shop today suggested the hard drive has probably thrown in the towel.

Is this likely? Why would that happen? The PC hasn`t been knocked or dropped or used in any unusual way.

Nothing to do with deleting the sulfnbk.exe `virus` and then restoring the file.

Thanks, Art

 

[deanas]

Even if the hard drive is going, if
you are using a startup disk in the
floppy it still should boot into dos.
What os are you using?

 

[deanas]

Whoops I see the main post said win98.
sorry

 

[art miller]

Does this help find the reason I can`t boot my PC?

I disconnected the drives and got the following results.

Hard disc disconnected.
Boot floppy in A.
Start sequence: A,C,SCSI
"No system disc. Booting from hard disc"
"Cannot load from hard disc."
"Insert system disc, press any key."
Removed boot disc.
Insert system disc.
"Invalid system disc. Replace and press any key"
Removed floppy.
Pressed key.
"DISC BOOT FAILURE. INSERT SYSTEM DISC AND PRESS ANY KEY"
CTRL,ALT,DELETE with boot floppy in.
Same error message.

---------------

With floppy disconnected.
"Floppy disc(s) fail (40)"
"Press F1 to continue, DEL to setup"
DEL/setup
BIOS sequence changed to C,CDROM,A
save and exit
Restarts.
"Floppy disc(s) fail (40)"
F1 = "Invalid disc etc......"

-----------------

Anyone got any ideas??

Thanks, Art

PS: Tried creating a new boot disc from your net link. But every floppy I tried to write to failed. "Bad sector 0 etc" Weird

Is it OK to make a boot disc using this (my daughter`s) PC?

 

[kilowatt1]

Greetings Art,BrianF ,Rugrat!

Can I make a suggestion? Why don't we just start from scratch and try to rebuid the system from step one. In other words, take out the hard drive, open the case, clear the CMOS and reconfigure the settings. This way we can see once and for all whether or not there is a hardware failure. What do you think? KW1

 

[rugrat]

At this point I would go with KW1's suggestion. However, before clearing the BIOS you should go through it page by page and write down all of the settings for future reference. If you let us know what motherboard is in the computer we could find the proper procedure for clearing your bios.

It is highly unusual not to be able to boot to the floppy with the hard drive disconnected. That leads me to believe it is a BIOS issue or a failure on the board somewhere. It is possible but unlikely that your hard drive and floppy both failed at the same time.

As far as the boot disk, any Windows 98 boot disk from any machine should work.

Sorry I can't be more help. Might be time to take it into a shop if you don't want to try the BIOS thing.

SeeYa

 

[deanas]

Ok i'm a little confused now. According to
your last post you tried to make a startup
disk but failed. I assume this is with a
second computer? Go ahead and make the
start up disk with your daughters computer.
Or if your daughters computer is using win 98
just make a start up disk from the add/remove
applet in control panel. Try the startup disk
in your daughters computer to see if it will
boot into dos there. If it does then try it on
the computer that's not booting.

 

[chriscmissle]

Yes, reinstall will delete all that you have on your system. If it is your only recourse, remember to back up your system from time to time. I found this out the hard way. If you get a response that helps reboot w/o reinstall please let me know. I need to keep that on hand as well. I like to try new things and don't always know what I am doing.

[email protected]

 

[art miller]

OK, Guys,

I`ll now make a note of the BIOS settings and any details of the motherboard that I can find.

This is getting to me. I just want my PC back!

Thanks, Art

PS: The PC is 18 months old, by the way. Could the battery have failed in that time?

PPS: With the boot disc in the floppy drive the details came up on the screen of the disc and then it said "Booting from hard disc" before failing and repeating the error message. Surely that would indicate that the floppy drive is working OK.