The hard drive took a dump this week on me, so swapped it out with an old one and was going two hours later on. No problem. The problem is in that the next hard drive initially shows off some H-P blue screen intro. And then Win 98 (SE) begins the boot sequence about one minute later on. How to I get to bios, or how do I get rid of it? Answers are still on my old (squeeky) hard drive. Sorry as to if this is in wrong catagory, as new window for questions does not permit this to be placed into proper area. Wm.

pls give us more info

"...the next hard drive initially shows off some H-P blue screen intro. And then Win 98 (SE) begins the boot sequence about one minute later on. How to I get to bios, or how do I get rid of it? " I'm assuming you installed this hard drive on your Dell computer. If you installed a hard drive that already had 98SE on it that was fomerly on a HP computer that still had it's original software installation, the logo screen is probably being loaded by the hard drive from a file on the hard drive, not from a file on the hard drive by the Dell bios. The key you press to get into the bios Setup is determined by the bios version the mboard has - if you have it connected to the Dell computer, that's the same as it was before - probably F1 or F2 - but that probably has nothing to do with the HP logo screen. Remove any bootable disks you have in CD or DVD drives . Press the key to get into the bios Setup repeatedly - don't hold it down, starting early in the boot sequence. If there is a setting there where you can disable loading a logo screen, disable it, save settings But - that probably won't get rid of the HP logo screen. It's probably being loaded by a line in Autoexec.bat When the Windows desktop screen loads.... Start - Run - type: sysedit (click OK or press Enter) Find the line in Autoexec.bat you think may be loading the logo screen and type rem(space) at the beginning of it, save Autoexec.bat, then reboot the computer. If you disabled the right line, the HP logo screen will be gone. ...... The first time you connect a hard drive that already has had 98SE installed on it when it was on another computer, onto a computer that has a different mboard or other different hardware, it can take considerably longer for 98SE to load than it normally does because it has to detect the changed hardware and attempt to load at least generic drivers for the hardware that is different. Sometimes it doesn't find everything it normally would if Setup had been run. If 98SE isn't working properly, or if not all the devices on the computer were detected, or in any case, this is a good idea.... If you have a full version 98SE CD, you should be able to get the 98SE installation on the hard drive to conform to the changed mboard and other changed hardware by booting with the CD, and doing an "overtop" installation of Windows. "Overtop" installation (Setup) = You install Windows in the SAME folder folder it's already in. Usually that's C:\Windows. When you do that, all existing programs that have been installed and existing user settings etc. are retained, you lose no user data, Windows just accomodtes to the changed hardware. You don't need the 98SE Product Key, unless certain data is damaged on the hard drive, which is unlikely in this case. (If it DOES require a Product Key, the one on the official Microsoft label on the HP computer you got the drive from will work fine.) .... After Setup is finished, OR IN ANY CASE, you will need to install drivers for hardware Windows doesn't have the built in drivers for, and you certainly need to install the main chipset drivers for the Dell mboard. The needed drivers are the ones for the components that came with your your Dell model, and if it's a desktop computer, any devices you have added to that, that need drivers. . "Product: Dell / DON'T KNOW" Go to the Dell site. You can identify the model by it's service tag number on the label on the outside of the case somewhere. OR you may be able to have them auto detect the model, if it's the Dell computer you access the Dell site with. Once you know the model, you can look up the drivers for it, download them, install them. If main chipset drivers are not listed for it, or if you're not sure whether they are, tell us what model it is, and we can then point you to where you can get the proper drivers. ......... "The hard drive took a dump this week on me" A hard drive that will no longer boot into Windows isn't necessarily failing. What were your symptoms? If you test it with hard drive manufacturer's diagnostics and the drive itself passes, any data problems the drive has can be fixed, one way or another. Check your hard drive with the manufacturer's diagnostics. See the latter part of response 1 in this: http://www.computing.net/windows95/... (thanks to Dan Penny for this link:) Hard Drive Diagnostics Tools and Utilities http://www.tacktech.com/display.cfm... If you don't have a floppy drive, you can get a CD image diagnostic utility from most hard drive manufacturer's web sites, but obviously you would need to make a burned CD, preferably a CD-R for best compatibilty, on another computer if you need to. If the hard drive itself tests okay, any data problems found can be fixed, one way or another.

Tube... In getting to Bios, have already tried F1 and F2, and got no place. Tried F-8 also, and got no place. Seems to ignore such requests. Know of a different way then? Way back when I had used one HD on a Dell computer that had labels all ripped off. Cannot identify it but remember it had some sort of MB that cited 430 Award Bios at boot up, and Copyright 1999. Got free from neigbor. It pooped out the power supply and neighbor short time afterwards "just happened" to have another very similar one. Bought at same exact time back when, but had Win 95 on it. I switched out the HD and it worked there also. Was faster than switching out the power supply. The, put the same former Dell (or H-P) HD into my faster 500 MH computer a few years ago, and use it a few times now, just to keep it honest and going, about every four months. It is considered to be an emergency one. But, now the bona fide Seagate HD squeeled, and pooped out. Installed the Extra 98 (from a bag of Dell parts) that had come out of the old Dell computers, and after five boot ups, am now surprized as to getting the blue. Hope to keep the former Dell HD in place for next few months of daily use, even though it cites H-P in blue now. (I figure neighbor used that HD in a few different machines over the years.) But main thing is I used to go to BIOS to eliminate such a mention. I already looked at the Autoexec.bat file, and nothing otu of the ordinary there. Is there yet another file I ought to look into, or go for the REGEDIT then? That stupid H-P in blue adds time to boot up sequence, and I don't ahve any H-P computers working around here anyway. Wm.

Try Del to get into the bios Setup. Whatever key you try, press it repeatedly, don't hold it down, starting early in the boot sequence - e.g. right after you hear the mboard beep once. The HP logo screen can't be loaded by the bios Setup unless the mboard has a HP bios version, and - you moved the clear cmos jumper on the mboardand moved it back, or you removed the mboard battery then replaced it - in both those cases you wouldget a "Cmos Checksum "error" or similar message while booting, until you set a date and time that are not thes ame as the bios defaults, in either the biosSetup or the operating system - or - you loaded bios defaults, which isn't likely since you are presently unaware of how to get into the bios Setup If the logo file is being loaded from the hard drive and it's not being loaded in Autoexec.bat, then it would be hard to find since we have no idea what it's name is. You could try searching for files named *.ini or *.dat that contain hp or logo, or search for hp*.bmp or hp*.jpg or logo.* etc. (the registry is a combo of two files - system.dat and user.dat) ..... "That stupid H-P in blue adds time to boot up sequence..." It only takes milliseconds at most to load the logo screen - the delay is due to something else. Windows probably won't load at about the speed it did before until all the missing drivers for the mboard and other devices have been installed, particularly the mboard main chipset drivers. ...... I would help if you could help to identify the mboard. - by it's bios string Go here, download BIOS AGENT. Run BIOS AGENT to find your bios string. - here's the link that downloads Bios Agent http://download.esupport.com/biosag... The current Bios Agent calls the bios string the Bios ID. Tell us the Bios ID it finds, or everything Bios Agent finds, and include any dashes, etc. - or - does it have an obvious model printed on it's surface somewhere? - it's often between slots or in the middle of the mboard - or - does it have a stuck on label with a brand name builder's part number on it. The one for the mboard itself is often on a label that also has a barcode on it. HP and Compaq part numbers have a xxxxxx-xxx part number, the latter ones usually being 001, 002, etc. - or - can you at least make out the make and model of the main chipset chips? E.g. Intel SB82437FX (437xx indicates it a 430 series chipset)

The blue hp boot screen could be the in the win98 boot file. Not in BIOS.