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I have an old 486 I use to play old games, while I
usually work, as now, with a macosx. Changing
configurations on the pc I replaced the io.sys file
with one downloaded from internet. Now I can't
boot the pc. I downloaded several boot disks, for
instance those of bootdisk.com, putting them on
floppy and booting the pc with them. I can only
access to the system setup from where i set boot
device to floppy. I hope you could give me some
good advice.. thank you.
Replacing IO.SYS was a really bad idea.
You might be able to restore it by booting with a floppy and entering
sys c:
You would want to use the exact DOS version as was originally on the hard drive.
You don't mention which version of DOS you're using - you may encounter problems with versions prior to 6.22
Drop the last year into the silent limbo of the past. Let it go, for it was imperfect, and thank God that it can go.
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I put command.com, io.sys ecc files ,downloaded
from the net (bootdisk.com ecc), into a floppy and
try to boot my 486 pc with that disk but I get the
non-system disk error. If you have any ideas
please help.
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You can download a self-extracting WinImage here:
http://freespace.virgin.net/x86.computers/msdosw9x.htm
This will be a MSDOS 6.22 bootable floppy.
If still will not work the suggest you have not expanded the Disk Image correctly.
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I can only work on mac until I rescue to boot the
pc, so I need something to just put on floppy that
makes this floppy boot the pc. All the files floppies
I tried were not recognized by the bios who
always tells me "this is not a system disk"
Always thanks for your time.
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If you have tried a number of bootable floppies AND you are certain they (or at least one of them) are good, yet you still receive the non-system disk fail message.
This would suggest the fault is on the pc.
Check in the bios to see that it is allows booting from a floppy disc AND looks first at the floppy then the hard disk.
Good Luck - Keep us posted.
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Guys, Giacomo's problem is that I don't think he can make a boot disk since he is downloading on a MAC. He can copy files, but not create a system disk. He needs another PC to do it.
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Fred - these were my thoughts when I advised at least one of the boot discs should be known to be good.
Best way to test it, as you say, is on another pc.
Regards - Mike
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But he will still need to know the exact version of DOS that was on the system so he knows what version of DOS boot disk to get. IO.SYS, Command.com and all system files on the disk must match in their DOS version and revision, or it will not boot. With a 486 system he could be using anything from DOS 3.00 to 6.22 and their files are not compatible with each other, much less something he just downloaded off of the Internet.
If he can get a bootable diskette, he should be able to use it to see if the original copy of IO.SYS is still on the disk drive somewhere. He could tell this by the file DATE. All system files for a specific version of DOS will have the same DATE/TIME stamp on them. If he can find it, he should be able to copy it over the "bad" one he put there.
A SYS C: command will not do him too much good in the long run if it is not done from a version of DOS that matches the rest of the DOS files on the disk drive.
His best bet would be to have someone download a DOS 6.22 boot diskette image for him and make one on their PC. Then he can use it to look at the system file dates on his system. From that date, he can then try to find the right IO.SYS file or a boot diskette for that version of DOS.
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Thank you all for help. I finally solved my problem
as I succeeded in finding a set of 4 floppies with
ms-dos 6.0 from a friend. I don't know why the files
downloaded didn't boot : I think the problem could
be both using the mac and the version of the dos
files. Bye-bye and thanks.
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I hav ms dos 3.1, i want to reboot it, i hav a start up disk, i would like to kno what i type in at (non system disk or disk error A:>) what command should i then type in?? please help thanks!
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You should have started a new post.
This one is almost 3 weeks old.If it is the proper startup disk then you would get the A:> prompt. You should not have any error messages.
We don't know anything more about your system except thatyou are trying to boot DOS3.1.
Normally that is all you get, the DOS prompt A:>. The next command would be the program that you want to run. Either some other DOS program (DIR, CHKDSK, etc) or an application (123, WP, etc.)
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