I was reinstalling my old 486 to be used as a simple game station, but even though I installed the operating sytem, it kept asking for a startup disk.

I've removed the partitions with an FDISK, and rewritten the MBR with an FDISK/MBR. I have then created again a primary DOS partition, and formatted the disk.

But now it doesn't even recognize my startup disks. Not even the DOS installation diskette.

If I put the DOS installation diskette, the computer gives a "Non-System disk or disk error" message. If I put a startup disk, it gives a "Disk I/O error" message.

Any ideas as to how can I solve this problem, or what is causing it??

Thanks.

Could be bad floppies or a bad FDD...

Is the bios boot device sequence set for the floppy drive first?

It's a good day when you learn something

Have you checked that the BIOS correctly recognizes the hard drive ?

Did you format in FAT16 ??

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;255867

You can download a winimage self-extracting DOS6.22 Boot disk here: http://83.67.55.228/boot622.exe

If he's;

"... removed the partitions with an FDISK, and rewritten the MBR with an FDISK/MBR. I have then created again a primary DOS partition, and formatted the disk."

then I would say the disk is recognized........

It's a good day when you learn something

Is the partition 'active'?

Did you partitiopn with 6.22?

'startup disk' sounds suspicious.

If at first you don't succeed, you're about average.

M2

I'd tend to go with response #1 (T-R-A) - - try another bootdisk, and if no change, consider changing the drive and/or its data cable

You might also try the disks on another machine just to see - it's not uncommon for a bad floppy drive to ruin diskettes

We've heard that a million monkeys at a million keyboards could produce the complete works of Shakespeare; now, thanks to the Internet, we know that is not true

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thank you all. It was indeed a bad FDD... I removed the case, disconnected everything and then I put it back together.

And it read the disks. :) I kept, however, mi initial problem, and it keeps asking for a startup disk, even after I've installed DOS.