Needing Working Boot Files...

Allright, I have 4 Old laptops here. I'm going to install 98se on all. Here's the problem. One of the laptops has a non removable floppy drive, the other 3 have cdroms. There is no way to boot to CDRom so I'm pretty much screwed on that.

Ya know when you put in a Windows Boot up diskette, it will install drivers for the CDROM? Well I have been working my *** off trying to build the right boot files to have on drive C, so it will do the same ****. But I can't get it to work. I'm stressing out soo bad. I've gotten really close, but its not close enough.

what I need is all the files necesary to copy over to each of the laptops hard drives, so I dont have to worry about a floppy drive, so that I can boot to the hard drive, and it will ask me if I want cdrom support and it will install the cdrom drivers so I can go to the CDrom inside DOS, and start the windows installation.

I'm soo stressed from not getting it all right, that I'm just about to give up. So thats why I'm comming to you guys, I'm sure you guys can figure it out. You should know what to do. Please Help me so I can install fresh copies of windows 98 on these bad boys.

The tops will be used for Tuners and Datalogers for OBD1 and 2. Not Carputers. Well one laptop might become a carputer, but I dont know.

Ok, here's everything. I start out by using a good Windows 98 SE Floppy, I boot into DOS and I format the drive using the following command:

A:\>Format C: /q/s

I dont give the drive a name at this point because of the hell I'm going through. Then I give it system properties with the command:

A:\>sys c:

After the system is Transfered. I copy all the files from the floppy to the hard drive:

A:\>copy *.* c:

When it asks to replace certain files, I make sure I dont replace the files I just added such as the Command.com and Drivespce.bin.

So now it copies over some 19 files. I edit the Autoexec.bat file to have the C:\ Path instead of the A:\ path since this boot setup will be used on hard drives on a system that has no A Drive.

I restart and here is exactly what happends:

Microsoft Windows 98 Startup Menu
============================

1. Start computer with CD-ROM support.
2. Start computer without CD-ROM support.
3. View the Help file.

Enter a choice: _

I choose 1 because I want to make sure that it loads the CDROM Drivers and it then gives me the Windows 98 Load screen for some odd reason. This freaked me out. Then it says:

Preparing to start your computer.
This may take a few minutes. Please wait...


Not ready reading drive A
Abort, Retry, Fail?

The only thing that will work is Abort or Fail. So I press Abort. and it gives me :

The Windows 98 startup disk could not create a temporary drive for the diagnostic tools. This may be because this computer has less than the minimum required extended memory.

Path not found - :\COMMAND.COM
Path not found - :\EXTRACT.EXE
Path not found - :\README.TXT
Bad command or file name
The diagnostic tools were sucessfully loaded to drive .

File not found

to get help, type HELP and press ENTER.

C:\>_

And here is the end... What do I do next?

Ok, I think the drivers are trying to load, but the first driver for the cdrom isn't working. Something about a "ERROR: PCI READ CONFIGURATION FAILURE" right when its supposed to specify the device letter.

You don't need to copy the startup disk to the c:\ partition. If you have a laptop with floppy drive then select with CD Rom support, change directory and run setup from the CD Rom.
For the other laptops without floppy drive copy the startup disk to a CD and boot from that CD.

1. Buy yourself a 2.5 to 3.5 hdd adapter, plug the drives into a desktop, install there, then move to laptop drive.

2. use 3.5 to 2.5 adapter, hook to desktop sys the drive (copy system files over) and copy the CD to it then install from there.

You could also try the bootdisks from www.bootdisk.com If you can find a Win98 OPK disk that makes the installation a lot easier (reads A, formats C, copies system files, reboots, copies all files from CD to HDD, reboots, starts UNATTENDED installation from harddrive.. then your done.. ) Its what OEM PC installers use in order to install all the software on a computer before they ship it out so when you turn it on you get the welcome screen and all that BS.. if you cant find an win98 OPK disk let me know I think I still have one laying around.. (and one for WinME too)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MGD

You don't need to copy the startup disk to the c:\ partition. If you have a laptop with floppy drive then select with CD Rom support, change directory and run setup from the CD Rom.
For the other laptops without floppy drive copy the startup disk to a CD and boot from that CD.

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Obviously you didn't pay attention. Two laptops dont have floppies, and the one that does doesn't have a cdrom.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 97GST

Obviously you didn't pay attention. Two laptops dont have floppies, and the one that does doesn't have a cdrom.

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Why not....


just find one laptop that you can boot and install on,
then remove the drives out the other laptops
then swap out the drives in the bootable laptop until you've installed win98se on the different drives and put them back.

:nutz:

I have a laptop and this is what I get "setup found a compressed volume or a disk-cache utility on your computer". I have run fdisk, kill disk, wipe disk etc but cannot wipe this compressed volume.
Any ideas on how to get rid of this compressed volume?

you could do a low level format with the drive manufacturers software available on their website. Or you could try something along the lines of Active@ Kill Disk. located here http://www.brothersoft.com/security/...ser_26173.html there are several other hard drive "killing" programs out there that will completely qipe out the drive.

You could also try Fdisk /mbr, to re-write the Master Boot Record. Reboot and then Fdisk, Re-Format and your good to go.

KPJ