hi all

This afternoon I installed new CD-RW on my machine. System has always been a little unstable, prone to crashing particularly in IE. Anyway, everything seemed to be fine after installation, was online downloading shareware when system crashed. Tried to reboot several times, never sucessfully loaded Windows(98). Then system failed to boot from HD - BIOS identifies HD but no boot. Booted from Win98 bootdisk, can access C: but no files??? Norton emergency disk doctor says error on HD requires low-level formatting for repair. Attempt to reinstall Win98 generates message that unable to create temp directory, suggests that a MS-DOS partition is required. What have I done to it? Is a reformat required?

Thanks
nskalie

Put your boot disk in and when it gets to the a:/ prompt
type in sys c:
Then after that reboot and see if that does the trick .

Seeya

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Sledgehammer will save the day!

Tried sys c: ; computer said invalid function. Nothing changed.
When I boot from the HD it says operating system is missing. When I biit from the boot disk it says can't find FAT partition. Forgot these details earlier oops!!!
Any more ideas???

Thanks
NSKalie

http://www.newlogic.co.uk/kbase/fdisk/page1.htm
try this link

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Sledgehammer will save the day!

Did you fdisk and partition your harddrive. http://www.newlogic.co.uk/kbase/fdisk/page1.htm

Do you have a virus protectionn?

Did you scan your computer?

Did you update the virus protection?
Did you get a suspious email lately?




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Sledgehammer will save the day!

OK, took the plunge and re-partitioned and formatted HD. Am reloading Win98, all seems to be going well now. Was hoping I could avoid it!
Yes I have virus protection although not as updated as it might be. I get very little email on this machine and have had nothing in recent weeks I would call suspicious - a couple of unsolicited offers from commercial sites I have occasion to frequent. Everything else is personal and clean as far as I know. I take it a virus is the most likely culprit but are there other possibilities?
Anyway, thanks for the help, the site reference was most useful.

nskalie

Hey,

Did you install the CD-RW on the same IDE ribbon cable as the harddrive? If so, and even if you didn't, check the connection on the harddrive. If it's pulled out ever so slightly, you could get that error message, or something like, "Harddisk Controller Error".

Double-check all connections before you go much further.

Cheers,

Big Blue 66


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Life = Karma, or is it, Karma = Life?

Have to chime in here with Big Blue on this one.

The HDD on the same ribbon cable with a CD-ROM or CD-RW can and usually does cause file corruption. Even if the HDD is at the end of the ribbon cable.

Luck.

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......Indecision may or may not be my problem......
...... Kickin' A Rock....