OldGrayGary

Hi again


Hope it all turns out well: here are the "over-the-top" in-place reinstall instructions from a guide I put together a few years ago:
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Windows 98/Me "Over-the-top" Reinstall

Sometimes an over-the-top reinstallation of Windows can be a timesaver. On most recent computers the whole procedure can take as little as 30 or 40 minutes. A nice feature of this procedure is that your programs do not have to be reinstalled, and your data is not lost. You likely will need to visit Windows Update when finished, though, to download and reinstall some of the Security Updates. [Windows Update still works for Windows 98/Me, even though its period of active support by Microsoft expired in mid-2006 (all the updates up to that point can still be found there)].

Beforehand:

You may need to temporarily disable the Bios virus protection that is found on some motherboards (if your motherboard does not have this feature, you can skip this step). Enter Bios Setup by pressing the key displayed during startup, and somewhere on the first or second menu should be an item to Enable or Disable Bios Virus Protection (might be called BiosShield, or VirusGuard, or whatnot) ---> then, when you're finished with your reinstallation of Windows, re-Enable the Bios protection feature.

During the reinstall, it is also a good idea to be entirely disconnected from any networks, wired or wireless (unplug ethernet cables, disable wireless), and to be disconnected from printers, scanners, cameras, multifunction devices, fax machines, PDAs, memory card readers, USB flash drives, external USB/Firewire/eSATA drives, etc.

Over The Top ReInstall:

Place your Windows98/Me CD in the CD/DVD drive (or be ready to point Windows to the place on your hard drive where your Windows 98/Me installation files are stored).

Boot with a bootable floppy or CD - "with CD-rom support", and from DOS rename the win.com file to win.bak. Like this

C:
cd \Windows
rename win.com win.bak

If you have the Windows 98/Me CD in your CD/DVD drive, you can then switch to the drive letter of your CD drive [often drive D:], simply by typing the drive letter followed by a colon ( for example - D: ) at the command prompt.

If you have the Windows 98/Me installation files on your hard drive, switch to that location (which is often C:\Windows\Options\Cabs - by typing cd C:\Windows\Options\Cabs ), and start setup (by simply typing the command: setup)

***Important!*** When Windows asks if you want to use the directory C:\Windows.000, instead choose Other and type in C:\Windows (without the .000 following).

Make sure that you have your antivirus, antispyware, and firewall running before you connect to networks afterward. Don't forget to visit Windows Update ASAP to get the Critical Patches the need reinstalling.
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Best of luck
. . . Gary

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