Windows 98 hangs at startup - I know the problem but not the fix

Here's my problem, which is apparently really common: Windows 98 is slow to start.The hard drive will be grinding along happily until just before the desktop, and then everything stops, and appears to be frozen. However, at about the point where I'm tempted to push reset, the computer will snap out of it and complete the start up without problems. I have a fairly good idea of what is the cause. After messing about with msconfig and having no luck, I used a free program called Boot Log Analyser to go through the bootlog.txt file, and I dug up what I believe to be the problem. Here are the longest processes, as they appear in the analyser program, that appear to be slowing everything down:

Duration: Event:

80.889 initing esdi_506.pdr

38.167 initDone=TSRQuery (time estimated)

10.833 INITCOMPLETE=SAVRT


Everything else is 6 seconds or less; the above 3 are the longest. So here's my predicament: Now that I've found the problem, what do I do? What does "esdi_506.pdr" run or do? Any advice is appreciated, if more details are needed, please let me know.

 

This is a well known problem, and I don't think anyone has come up with the definitive answer. Certainly I used to have it and I spent ages trying to remove it - with no success. It was only when I changed my mobo and re-installed that it went away.

I think it is down to the combination of Mobo, Disk and the Disk drivers.

 

esdi_506.pdr
Has something to do with making Smart Drives compatible with win95

Go here http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;154435 and have a read and see if the article can help you.

 

By the way, I suspect the delay is being caused by some function that MS decided not to log. I have studied the logs of several machines displaying this delay, and the apparent cause is different in each case.