Here's the deal as short and sweet as I can make it. I have an older Lifebook laptop that I am trying to fix for a friend, and I have run into some problems. The computer I guess used to have Win98SE, and then she upgraded to WinXP, but lost some of the items that she was using [like using the infrared stylus pen]. So anyway she asked me if I could downgrade it to Win98SE, which should have been fine except that when I formated the drive I lost the drivers for the external CD-ROM [a Vintech Portable Slim 4x/ 4x/24x, CD-RW/DVD drive] . I was expecting this, and it should have been a problem but disk with the drivers claims that it should work in DOS, but I have had no luck. I had a Win98SE cd, but something seems to be wrong with it, and I tried my best to fix the autoexec.bat and config.sys to get it to read the driver, but no luck. The cd-rom can be connected either by PCMCIA card, or via USB, but I have been unable to get any of the [14 drivers] that I have downloaded to recognize the device. I have tried some things and below is my autoexec.bat and config.sys I don't really care if I get the CD-ROM to work using USB or PCMCIA, as long as it works. Any help would be greatly appreciated. CONFIG.SYS [menu] menuitem=CD, Start computer with CD-ROM support. menuitem=NOCD, Start computer without CD-ROM support. menuitem=HELP, View the Help file. menudefault=CD,30 menucolor=7,0 [CD] device=C:\DRIVERS\himem.sys /testmem:off DEVICE=C:\PICC\PICC.exe DEVICE=C:\PICC\PICD.exe /D:_PICD_$$ device=C:\DRIVERS\oakcdrom.sys /D:_PICD_$$ device=C:\DRIVERS\btdosm.sys device=C:\DRIVERS\flashpt.sys device=C:\DRIVERS\btcdrom.sys /D:_PICD_$$ device=C:\DRIVERS\aspi2dos.sys device=C:\DRIVERS\aspi8dos.sys device=C:\DRIVERS\aspi4dos.sys device=C:\DRIVERS\aspi8u2.sys device=C:\DRIVERS\aspicd.sys /D:_PICD_$$ [NOCD] device=C:\DRIVERS\himem.sys /testmem:off [HELP] device=C:\DRIVERS\himem.sys /testmem:off [COMMON] files=10 buffers=10 dos=high,umb stacks=9,256 devicehigh=ramdrive.sys /E 2048 lastdrive=z AUTOEXEC.BAT @ECHO OFF set EXPAND=YES SET DIRCMD=/O:N set LglDrv=27 * 26 Z 25 Y 24 X 23 W 22 V 21 U 20 T 19 S 18 R 17 Q 16 P 15 set LglDrv=%LglDrv% O 14 N 13 M 12 L 11 K 10 J 9 I 8 H 7 G 6 F 5 E 4 D 3 C cls C:\DRIVERS\MSCDEX /D:_PICD_$$ call setramd.bat %LglDrv% set temp=c:\ set tmp=c:\ path=%RAMD%:\;a:\;%CDROM%:\ copy command.com %RAMD%:\ > NUL set comspec=%RAMD%:\command.com copy extract.exe %RAMD%:\ > NUL copy readme.txt %RAMD%:\ > NUL :ERROR IF EXIST ebd.cab GOTO EXT echo Please insert Windows 98 Startup Disk 2 echo. pause GOTO ERROR :EXT %RAMD%:\extract /y /e /l %RAMD%: ebd.cab > NUL echo The diagnostic tools were successfully loaded to drive %RAMD%. echo. IF "%config%"=="NOCD" GOTO QUIT IF "%config%"=="HELP" GOTO HELP LH %ramd%:\MSCDEX.exe /D:_PICD_$$ / L:%CDROM% echo. GOTO QUIT :HELP cls call help.bat echo Your computer will now restart and the startup menu will appear. echo. echo. echo. echo. echo. echo. echo. echo. echo. echo. restart.com GOTO QUIT :QUIT echo To get help, type HELP and press ENTER. echo. rem clean up environment variables set CDROM= set LglDrv=

USB for DOS drivers: www.mwpms.uklinux.net/usbfire.txt PCMCIA for DOS you need Cardware "Card and Socket Services" software: http://www.tssc.de/index.htm

For PCMCIA support, you can also try Phoenix PCMCIA Manager 4.01 for DOS (note: PC-DOS 2000 includes Phoenix PCMCIA Manager 3.01), which is available from the Internet.

Mike C's has a PCMCIA page: http://www.oldstuff.myagora.net/powerload/ Cardworks "Card and Socket Services" software: http://www.systemsoft.com/l-2/l-3/products-other.htm

Thanks for all the replies, unfortunately I didn't have any luck. Since it seems that I need card socket services, and I don't have them, and don't want to pay $70 for them. I have decided to go the USB route, and I've tried just about every USB driver for DOS that I have run across in the previous responses, and have still been unable to get them working properly. I have been trying to get ahold of the company, but with no luck [Vintech International Co. Ltd.] If anyone has any other ideas please let me know. Thanks again