Allen Lilly

Hi both

thanks for these pointers

I do have another machine, but it doesn't have a floppy drive. I just took a floppy disc to the internet cafe, but I couldn't get either killdisc's bootable floppy disc creator or bootdisk's Me bootdisc to sucessfully write to it (despite numerous reformattings, quick and bootable and the fact that it was working fine with userdata). I guess I'll try again with another floppy tomorrow.



Back at the problem machine:

If I boot the machine without any discs in, I just get the manufacturers's splash screen, followed by a black screen saying "Operating system not found".

If I tap the F2 key while the manufacturer's splash screen is showing, I can get to the BIOS settings. Under the boot menu there are three entries
"removable devices", "hard drive" and "CD/DVD drive" (no mention of a sequence). "Removable devices" is highlighted. If I change it to boot from
the CD drive (then F10 to save and exit), it restarts, but it seems that my changes have not been saved. It still tries to grab at the a: drive while
the manufacturer's splashscreen is showing. The BIOS boot menu still has "removable devices" highlighted.

I don't know whether the manufacturer's "system restore pack" CD is bootable, this is what's on it:
1.pcx 11.1 KB (11349 bytes) 01/04/2000 08:50:02
2.pcx 25.2 KB (25813 bytes) 01/04/2000 08:53:10
3.pcx 16.0 KB (16423 bytes) 01/04/2000 09:43:52
4.pcx 21.3 KB (21855 bytes) 01/04/2000 09:02:10
changelog.txt 0.2 KB (205 bytes) 27/04/2001 05:32:38
DIHELP.DAT 91.8 KB (93952 bytes) 11/09/2000 21:00:00
MOUSE.COM 36.8 KB (37681 bytes) 11/09/2000 21:00:00
PQER.EXE 28.9 KB (29582 bytes) 11/09/2000 21:00:00
PQER.OVL 857.8 KB (878353 bytes) 11/09/2000 21:00:00
pqer.pqg 12.3 KB (12596 bytes) 09/09/2000 06:51:08
Pqer.pqi 630.63 MB (661258240 bytes) 27/04/2001 05:21:28
PQER.RTC 0.5 KB (543 bytes) 04/01/2001 02:28:58
Restore.pcx 45.9 KB (47013 bytes) 05/01/2001 07:29:40

The floppy has an autoexec.bat on it.


For completeness :


1) If I boot up with the manufacturers "System Restore Pack" floppy and CD in the a: and D: drives, I get

CR101:not ready reading drive Y (btw - there is no drive Y)
Abort Retry Fail

a
types a .txt file called mainmenu.txt which sets out my options 1, 2 and 3
1 is to use Second Chance (a proprietary "restore to a known back up point" software) which isn't on the machine since its 'upgrade' to XP
2 Restore (to factory settings) - this types a file restore.txt "are you sure you want to continue etc", on selecting Y it cycles back to
CR101:not ready reading drive Y Abort Rety Fail
3 return to command prompt from which I can list, read and run the files on the a: drive (or on another floppy I put in it),

r just cycles the same drive Y error message

f returns "The disc in the CD/DVD-ROM drive is incorrect, replace and press a key."



2) Booting from just my "Emergency Boot Disc" (a floppy, made with the proprietarry Second Chance software way back), it types a txt file saying
Starting Windows ME Emergency boot, Powerquest Second Chance, then just gives an a: prompt. Again I can type and run the files on a:, but
typing c: returns Invalid Drive Specification.