formatting an old computer...error messages

[joko]

hi

i was given an oldish computer that has little space and is full of previous owners crap that we cannot delete so i have formatted the drive in dos, but not installed windows yet

however, now on start up it comes up with the error message "non system disk, replace disk and strike any key" - now i am very familiar with this message and usually you just remove the disk and it boots up fine, but now it just repeats the message, whent here is no disk in any of the drives.

when i tried using a start up floppy disk the error message just says "floppy disk(s) fail (40) - this comes up on the same page that shows the primary and master slaves etc.

any thought?

thanks

[Garamond]

It sounds as though you haven't made any of your drives active. How about reformatting the drive changing the partitions, if there are any, and if not, just make sure the one drive is the master and not the extended one.

[joko]

hi garamond,

how can i format again?

last time i went into command prompt by pressing f8 on start up - i cant get past this stage to get into start up.

it does acknowledge the hard drive and cd rom on start up as primary masters

thanks

[OBonio]

Has it got a cd-rom? Get a windows disk and boot from the cd-rom.... you will get the option to format the drive again. By the way, you probably formatted C: without making it bootable.

format c: /s or something like that in DOS 6.22.

[Garamond]

I think OBonio's just about summed it up. Try it and if unsuccessful come back and we'll try something else.

[sarah_louise]

Have you been inside the case ? If so check again that the floppy drive connector is not dislodged. fail 40

You did not say what OS ?
A Windows 98 CD if you have one always rescues these situations as it creates the CD Driver and enough virtual RAM to get an installation started and create a partition
I have found difficulty with the XP installation disk doing this .

[joko]

cheers guys

it was originally 98 but i was trying to load xp so maybe thats a problem as it wasn't even acknowledging there was a disk in the cd drive

i will try it again with 98 and do as you all suggest - if i can find the 98 disk!

the computer is not at my house - its at my mums, so i won't get chance to try again for a few days, possibly next week, so please come back and check this thread again

thanks

[Garamond]

I think you'll find the formatting for Win98 will be different to that of XP. The only thing I can suggest is if you're using Win98 place your boot-up disc and reboot then follow screen instructions. If using XP adjust your booting options so instead of reading from the floopy first it reads from the cd rom tray you'll be putting your disc in and reboot. Following screen instructions for installing a fresh installation. It'll check everything's ok before it starts.