Forum Home
Press F1
 
Thread ID: 54295 2005-02-08 22:37:00 How do I fix the KRNL386.exe error.... straka01 (310) Press F1
Post ID Timestamp Content User
322807 2005-02-08 22:37:00 I have a PC that I loaded win98se onto for a friend and all was going very well.
I asked her to bring her scanner, printer, monitor & keyboard so I could make sure all were set up properly with their drivers.
After I plugged them in and switched on the OS wouldn't load up and it stopped with a message "Cannot find or load required file KRNL386.exe".
I searched high and low but cannot find this file anywhere - in fact I can't find it on other PCs using the same OS.
The only way I can load up the OS is in Safe-Mode.
Can someone tell me how to fix this problem?
Thanks
straka01 (310)
322808 2005-02-08 23:33:00 ms kb article (support.microsoft.com) gibler (49)
322809 2005-02-09 20:16:00 Can you clarify for me what this means (from the Microsoft site...)?

Make sure that your Windows directory is on your MS-DOS path?

and

Make sure that your path statement does not contain more than 128 characters?

Where is this path program - WIN.INI, SYSTEM.INI or somewhere else?
Do I edit it from MSCONFIG ????
straka01 (310)
322810 2005-02-09 20:33:00 Someone will correct me if I am wrong but I think you should be looking at the next section, ie "If Windows 95/98 Was Installed/Uninstalled" rather than the first section.

The other thing you could also try is reinstalling Windows again.
FoxyMX (5)
322811 2005-02-09 22:52:00 I tried re-installing windows - but it had not effect on the problem.
I would rather not format and start installing from fresh if I can find a work-around. Thanks
straka01 (310)
322812 2005-02-09 23:10:00 Can you clarify for me what this means (from the Microsoft site . . . )?

Make sure that your Windows directory is on your MS-DOS path?

and

Make sure that your path statement does not contain more than 128 characters?

Where is this path program - WIN . INI, SYSTEM . INI or somewhere else?
Do I edit it from MSCONFIG ????


you may need to swot up on DOS commands .

The Path statement is in autoexec . bat file, which is a text file located in the root of the C drive, C:\ . It can be viewed and edited with Notepad .

Autoexec . bat should contain this path statement as a minimum:

PATH=C:\;C:\WINDOWS;C;\WINDOWS\COMMAND

The limit on 128 characters then follows as obvious :)

Other programs may add to their own bit to the path statement
Terry Porritt (14)
322813 2005-02-09 23:22:00 if you cant load windows you can still edit the autoexec.bat file by using a boot floppy but again dos comand are needed after booting you will get

A:\

type in
path=c:\windows\command

press the enter key

type in
edit c:\autoexec.bat

press the enter key

edit is a very basic dos file editor

this will allow you to edit autoexec.bat without windows being loaded
when it says add windows to your path statement add this to the autoexec.bat

path=c:\windows
beama (111)
322814 2005-02-10 00:41:00 I've tried this but I still have the same problem.

I can't find win386.exe on the PC at all! There's only win386.swp.
Has this file been deleted (I haven't deliberately deleted any system files) or isn't it needed. If it's needed why wouldn't it have reloaded when I re-installed the OS?
straka01 (310)
322815 2005-02-10 00:55:00 On my W98se, KRNL386 is in C windows system. No Win386.exe though - only the swap file.
Bye
Peter H (220)
322816 2005-02-10 01:17:00 This PC has this same configuration. KRNL386.exe is in the c:\windows\system folder

I even added c:\windows\system to the PATH in autoexec.bat

Still the same.
straka01 (310)
1 2 3