Win 98 has stopped booting up

[scott jayson]

hi. first time here so thanks, and hope i don't do anything stupid/annoying until i get the hang.

my other/older machine is running windows 98. i keep my activities on it to a bare minimum.

recently it has just stopped booting up when turned on. within 10 seconds it locates the floppy and CD drives, displays "Initialize plug and play cards" and then simply goes no further.

is this a common fix? anybody got any ideas?

thanks

scott

[98user]

scott, there could be many reasons ranging from bad cable connections to a corrupted
registry. I suggest you try some self help by using the working PCs internet search to find info on "Win98 boot problem" - without the quotes. Have you added, removed or
changed anything that could account for the problem ?

[scott jayson]

thanks . i'll look around.

no changes whatsoever, either in hardware or software or even settings. can the registry
spontaneously corrupt without any "event" to trigger it? although this machine is connected to my network i never connect to the internet with it, etc.

i suppose for bad cable connections, i could get inside and wiggle everything to make sure it's all good.

thanks, i appreciate your comments.

scott

[98user]

scott, maybe you have it fixed now but I wondered what you see with a
step-by-step boot ?

[scott jayson]

i'll give that a shot, but i'm afraid you'll have to get me started. not much of a techy. i've tried starting up in a couple of different modes to see if anything dislodges, but i dunno how to do a step-by-step boot. can you beak it down for me?

thank you!

scott.

[Murf]

Welcome to CTH

1. Boot and immediately get into SETUP (screen tells you how - either a "F" key or DEL key).

Once in SETUP look around as each computer is different. Find where you can set "DEFAULTS", may say System Defaults. Do that (screen tells you what keys to use to navigate), now find where you can SAVE & EXIT.

Does it boot up?

[scott jayson]

hey murf,

i have been away for a while, so no work got done on my old machine for a few weeks.

i just wanted to send you a big thank you for your advice. i restored the defaults in set-up and the old girl booted up for me. i really appreciate you sharing your knowledge with people who are less skilled and experienced.

thank you!

scott