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Thread ID: 55864 2005-03-21 09:35:00 /sand Sand (7332) Press F1
Post ID Timestamp Content User
336500 2005-03-22 03:10:00 Have you got a CD for Windows 98? Or a boot floppy? The least destructive thing to try would be to boot from a floppy, and do fdisk /mbr. The boot disks can be downloaded ... someone will give us a link for that. Graham L (2)
336501 2005-03-22 04:05:00 The link http://www.bootdisk.com

Now it will need to be a Windows type boot disk, Win98SE is good enough, either the custom one, which doesn't load in RAMDISK or the original which does, all they require are IBM formatted floppies, they don't have to be empty, but they will lose all information off that disk due to the image (copy of disk cotents) written over the disk.

Cheers,


KK
Kame (312)
336502 2005-03-28 23:35:00 Yep sent boot disk and the computer is up and running again however if they turn the computer off, they have to reboot from the disk each time they turn it on, so they are just leaving it on. Any ideas?? Sand (7332)
336503 2005-03-28 23:50:00 Yep sent boot disk and the computer is up and running again however if they turn the computer off, they have to reboot from the disk each time they turn it on, so they are just leaving it on. Any ideas??

Reinstall windows.
pctek (84)
336504 2005-03-28 23:53:00 Yep sent boot disk and the computer is up and running again however if they turn the computer off, they have to reboot from the disk each time they turn it on, so they are just leaving it on. Any ideas??

Sounds to me that the battery which keeps the BIOS information is dead. When the computer is turned off it then forgets it has a hard drive.

Have the motherboard battery replaced.
AMD1 (6552)
336505 2005-03-29 02:30:00 It doesn't sound to me as if the BIOS is forgetting anything. ;)

It seems to me that the MBR is still not fixed. That is a sector on the disk which the BIOS knows where to find on any disk. To "boot" the computer, code in the BIOS looks at that sector of each disk in turn for one which starts with a tag which idemtifies it as bootable. It then loads the data in that sector (which contains information about the disk, and some more executable code). The BIOS then tranfers control to that code, which then starts loading the operating system from the hard disk. [To those more pedantic than I, I am aware that is a simplified description. So what?]

Did your daughter (in the "black screen" DOS command mode) do the fdisk /mbr instruction?
Graham L (2)
336506 2005-03-31 10:28:00 Thank you for the simplified explanation we need it as simple as possible. Replaced the battery and it seems to be ok but they haven't tried turning it off yet so will wait with baited breath. Thanks eveyone Sand (7332)
336507 2005-03-31 22:35:00 Our 486 did this and it was simply a matter of replacing the battery.

Then my 4 yr old son and I took it to pieces. Amazing how a motherboard looks just like a miniature city. Hours of fun. :D
Winston001 (3612)
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