If you use the Diskcopy command to copy a startup disk, the copy will also be a startup disk. If you use copy or xcopy to copy a startup disk, the copy usually will not be a startup disk. Why is this so? and how can I or what can I do to make it so I can use the copy command to make a startup disk, I have 5 1/4" Dos 5 disks I want to copy to 3 1/2"..

Hi, Although I have never yet encountered this problem.....knock on wood. The problem may be in how you system deals with copying from a 740 to a 1.4 disk. There is a story about a cup of man who had a cup of coffe and his wife a cup of tea. There problem was his coffee was in her tea cup and her tea in his coffee cup. So how do they correct this? The answer is simple. A third cup. Pour his coffee into it. Her tea into the now empty cup then his coffee from the third cup into his own cup. So. Create a dir on C: then copy the 5.25 into the dir. Copy B:*.* c:\mystuff enter then Copy C:\mystuff\*.* a: enter Xcopy can have a problem copying itself. ie xcopy a: B: If xcopy is on a: and the command is issued in A: and the xcopy in A: is the one being used, the command will work but the xcopy will most likly fail. An xcopy command issued from c: will copy a xcopy file on a: to b: ok though. Weird Huh? Any how....when a copy problem arrises use a third cup. Hope this of some help. Peace Goodwill and Happy Computing World Library

Opps I forgot to mention attributes. If there are hidden files you will need to change them. If you want to try xcopy again instead of a third dir, look up xcopy and get the \ \ \ swithes that will copy files with any attributes. Off to the www...................

Hi, The World Library give you the excellent description of the procedure, but I want to add some details to it. 1. Yes, you need to copy all files from 5.25" startup disk (including hidden ones) to some directory on the C: drive. 2. Create startup 3.5" disk in any version of DOS or Win95 system. And then delete all files from it. Thus make the disk bootable. 3. Now copy files to the new startup disk, but it's very important to do this in the right order and one by one. First copy Io.sys file, then Msdos.sys file, and at last Command.com file. After that copy all other files in any order. That's all. I always use this method to make startup disk for the old DOS versions from backup archive. Good luck, Igor M

Igor, thanks for the reply, I can do it that way, the files when you make a startup disk doesn't even show up when you use even the /S or the /H what I want to know is how to make those files show so you can copy them also..(besides IO.SYS MSDOS.SYS COMMAND.COM) there must be a hidden file in side the command.com or something,that disappears because if I use the copy command to move it to another Dir. then back, the disk won't work as a system disk. what are those files that make it a system disk, just IO.SYS MSDOS.SYS COMMAND.COM don't make it a system disk.. THANK YOU Keithmj.

Hi, You can remove the System, Hidden, and ReadOnly attributes by Attrib command. For example: ATTRIB -R -H -S IO.SYS to do that you need Attrib.exe file. And then as I mentioned before it's very important to copy files in specified order and one at a time, because when system start to boot it can't use directory entries at that moment. So the system files must be located at the very begining of the disk in standard order. And you're almost right about some hidden file needed to make start disk. But this is not a file exactly. This is Boot record located in the very first sector of the disk. You can't copy this record (or delete it) - you can only create it when you use SYS command, or FORMAT /S command (or Win95 feature) to create Startup disk. So when you moved Io.sys, Msdos.sys, and Command.com files to another Dir this Dir must be on ANOTHER drive (e.g. C:). Then you need to delete ALL files on startup disk to clear all directory entries on it - in that case the first file you copy on disk will be placed at the very begining of the disk. Then you copy Io.sys, then Msdos.sys and then Command.com. You need to copy them one by one in the mentioned order. If you will use one copy command to copy all files (e.g. COPY *.* A:) you can't guarantee Io.sys file will be placed at the begining of the disk. And when you copy all files to the startup disk you don't need to restore Hidden, System, and Readonly attributes. Actually this attributes not needed to use startup disk. If files was placed in the right order startup disk will work with any files attributes. Good luck, Igor M