Start up problems..............

[grouch]

I recently bought a new computer system which had a faulty HDD. Whilst the drive was away for replacement I fitted in my old HDD from my old system which runs Win98.
I then installed WinXP onto the old drive. The new drive has arrived and the old drive has been put back onto my old system. Now though, my old system won't boot up - presumably because it is too old to support XP?
Anyone know how to format old drive back to Win98?

[degsy]

Welcome :)
If you're not worried about loosing data then create/download a Win98 Startup disk ( http://www.bootdisk.com )

Boot from the disk and choose to boot with CD-ROM support.

At the prompt type
format c:
then press enter and follow the instructions.

Then to run the setup type
d:\setup.exe
and press enter
(assuming that d: is your CD-ROM, change it as neccessary).

[grouch]

Thanks for info. Will try.

Grouch.:wave:

[grouch]

Hi.

Followed ionstructions. Boots so far and gets stuck.

Searching for boot record from floppy.

Then from IDE & says ok.

Then I get msg. invalid system disk replace disk and press any key.

Duh.

Any more ideas?:dizzy:

[degsy]

What bootdisk did you use?

If you downloaded one from bookdisk.com then did you extract it onto a floppy?
You need to double-click the .exe file and it will create the startup floppy.

[slang417]

i am having a similar problem. i am getting the "invalid system disk message".
i created a boot disk on a floppy and then put it on a cd and then tried to boot it but the same message still comes up. i have tried serveral different boot disks and have gone into bios setup and changed boot priority fdd->hdd both ways and it doesn't work either way. i dont get any prompt just always goes to the error message. any help would be appreciated. thanks

[degsy]

[quote]
created a boot disk on a floppy and then put it on a cd and then tried to boot
[quote]
That is a different problem.

You need to create a Boot CD, not just copy the files to a CD.

[slang417]

i created a correct boot disk like you said. thanks for that advise but it still wont work and still says the same error. any more ideas
thanks

[airdale]

. Hi,
1. Boot up with W98 disk
2. Select Option 2
3. A:\ type (syc C:) with out the parentheses
and you should get "System Transferred"
you should be able to boot up

Note:
This copies system files from the floppy to your hard drive then fixes the files so you can boot

Airdale