I had to format my laptop, short of a long story... I can access dos via floppy bootdisk but i cant get access to my cd drive to install Win ME. The boot disk has all the CD drivers & even asks me if i want to start the PC with CD support. The problem is I cant have both the CD drive & floppy drive in the laptop at the same time, removeble drives. As a result the boot disk cant detect the CD drive. Its a nightmare! Im a complete novice when it comes to dos. Ive copied all the files from the floppy bootdisc (drivers, autoexec.bat etc) to hard drive & placed my CD drive back in the laptop but when i run autoexec from my hard drive it tries to access my floppy, which was removed to accomodate the CD drive. I ain't got a clue please, please help! Im only a beginner and its driving me mad!

"but when i run autoexec " Autoexec.bat runs automatically upon booting, if located in the root of a bootable drive (C:\) - it makes no sense to 'run' it. If autoexec is trying to access the floppy, then it must contain references to the a: drive It's a "nightmare" because you don't seem to know what you're doing - your system has what are called swappable drives. In order to set it up to install Windows, you need to make the hard drive bootable and have it load the DOS CD drivers from there so you can dispense with the FDD. Some instructions on how to do that at Mesich's site - they're for Windows 98 - it may be advisable to use a WinME bootdisk Since the drive is already formatted and boots, you probably only need to focus on setting up the drivers in autoexec.bat & config.sys The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing..if you can fake that, you've got it made.

Yet another "my laptop" question Please define "my laptop" as in the BRAND and MODEL. (I spose it could be a Dell, but you really didn't exactly say) Speaking of the BRAND and MODEL, have you been to the manufacturer's support website to see how "they" do it? Some of these drives are "hot" swappable. That means you can boot with one, then swap in the other. If not, you can do a couple of things. Configure a floppy normal startup/fdisk/format, and get the hard drive formatted the way you want. Now copy or edit and autexec.bat/config.sys for the hard drive, and boot witht the floppy, "sys" the drive. (Sys.com will HAVE to be on the floppy) Now copy your autoexec/config files, as well as the CDROM drivers to the hdd. If you do this correctly, the hdd will boot and load the CD drivers. Alternatively, you can get a hdd "cable adaptor" which will allow you to temporarily install your laptop hdd into your desktop, and copy the setup files you need that way. Another thing: Is the CDROM bootable? Are you sure? How about your ME CD, is it bootable? (I'm not familiar with ME, for example, all my NT CD's are bootable, as is W2K and X tra P utrid. W95 CD's are NOT bootable. W98 are a mix. So far as I know NONE of the retail CD's, either "full" or "upgrade," will boot. So far as I know, all of the so called "OEM" W98 cds will boot. These are the ones that said something in effect "To be supplied only with a new PC." Here's the deal. If you have a laptop that is new enough to run ME, I would bet that the CDROM drive will boot. If your ME CD is not bootable, can you burn one? There are ways to take a non bootable CD, copy the contents to a "burned" CD, and use a bootdisk to make a bootable CD. I even have one with W95 AND W98 install files on it, although I don't use W95 much anymore. WHAT BRAND AND MODEL is "my laptop"?? Maybe the reason I'm so cranky about this is that I used to sell auto parts, as in 15 years. "I need a fuel pump for my Chivvy, they're all the same." Well, they are NOT all the same, that's why we used to stock about 15damdiffernt ones back there on the shelf just for "Chivvy's"

As jboy indicates, get rid of any refs to drives in autoexec and config. If it has this: device = a:\himem.sys change it to: device = himem.sys And help yourself to a large dose of clear and well written instructions here: http://www.hexff.com/win98_install.php M2