Hi, I'd be glad if anyone can help me with this wierd issue. I'm trying to fix an old computer that belongs to me friend. The problem is that one day when he started his computer after POST, he got the following message: "Remove disk or media, press any key to continue " , when he rebooted the system another message appeared" boot disk failure, insert the bootable disk and press enter" we disconnected all hard drives(two) and rebooted, the same errors came up. we disconnected all the expansion card except the graphic card, but the same error message appeard. What it does is that it passes the POST, somtimes it detects the master hard drive as tha correct booting option, but sometimes it doesn't. SOmetimes it detects a long wierd name as the primary master hard disk. after it lists all the hardware it detected, it tries to search a bootable media in floppy drive! that's where the error messages appear. I wanted to replace the floppy drive with aother one and try it, but I did not have an spare one. Next thing I wanna do is to upgrade the bios, may be something in the ROM is corrupted and is causing all these problems. Does anyoe know if I'm on the right track? Can anyone help me please???

You did check that the BIOS battery is not dead ??

It's probably a HDD issue, but it could also be a PSU issue. It might even be a bad ribbon cable.

You need to watch the POST screens to see what hardware is being configured. If the harddrive is not being seen then check cabling first. If the harddrive is seen then enter the BIOS screens and check the boot order. If the date and time in the first BIOS screen is wrong then change the battery on the MBoard. Nickel sized flat silver battery like an oversized watch battery. The message you firts mentioned is usually caused by a floppy left in the floppy drive. If POST screens are not visable then enter the BIOS screens and disable fast boot and any logos at startup. Can't help more with how to enter the BIOS because NA isn't much to go on.

The messages you are getting are normal if the computer bios is not finding a bootable disk for some reason. "The message you firts mentioned is usually caused by a floppy left in the floppy drive. " ...if the floppy disk in the drive is not bootable. However, some bioses may display that message or similar even if there is no floppy in the floppy drive, and no bootable disk is found. If you haven't been fiddling with bios Setup settings, not finding a bootable drive can be caused by a poor data cable connection, or a failing hard drive not being detected. Some bios Setups have a setting that delays the detection of hard drives so that they can be found every time while booting rather than just sometimes, if you have that problem, but if you haven't changed that setting the hard drive should be found as bootable if it and it's connections are ok. However, if the cmos battery is too weak or dead, all custom settings in Setup are lost. "If the date and time in the first BIOS screen is wrong then change the battery on the MBoard." If the battery is too weak or dead, the bios Setup settings and the time and date will reset to defaults, and you will get a message every time you boot the computer from power off "Cmos Checksum Failure" or similar. If you're not getting that message the battery is probably ok. ..... "SOmetimes it detects a long wierd name as the primary master hard disk." The only time I have seen that is when the ram has a poor connection in it's slot(s), but in theory it could also be caused by a failing hard drive. A common thing that can happen with ram, even ram that worked fine previously, is the ram has, or has developed, a poor connection in it's slot(s). This usually happens a long time after the ram was installed, but it can happen with new ram, or after moving the computer case from one place to another, and I've had even new modules that needed to have their contacts cleaned. See response 2 in this - try cleaning the contacts on the ram modules, and making sure the modules are properly seated: http://www.computing.net/hardware/w... It's also possible you have a data cable connection problem. The following also applies to floppy drive data cables. It is common to un-intentionally damage IDE data cables, especially while removing them - the 80 wire ones are more fragile than the 40 wire ones. What usually happens is the cable is ripped at either edge and the wires there are either damaged or severed, often right at a connector or under it's cable clamp there, where it's hard to see - if a wire is severed but it's ends are touching, the connection is intermittant. Another common thing is for the data cable to be separated from the connector contacts a bit after you have removed a cable - there should be no gap between the data cable and the connector - if there is press the cable against the connector to eliminate the gap. ...... Check your hard drive with the manufacturer's diagnostics. See the latter part of response 1 in this: http://www.computing.net/windows95/... It's possible you can't do that on this computer for other reasons, such as your power supply is failing, and in that case you may need to connect it to another computer to test it, but if you do, don't connect it or set the other bios to boot from it - XP will not boot into Windows if the mboard chipset is significantly different and that is normal. You only need to test the drive using the floppy based diagnostics. Telling signs of a dead hard drive: - it doesn't spin (rare - more commonly caused by a failing or dead PS or some other reason - try it connected to another computer if it doesn't spin) - it makes thrashing sounds - larger chips on it's logic board get too hot to keep your finger on (often) - it is not recognized on any computer by the bios or by any program. Less likely.... Failing power supplies are common and can cause your symptoms. Hard drives require both 12v and 5v - if the PS is failing either or both may be not be being produced. Check your PS. See response 4 in this: http://www.computing.net/hardware/w...

check out on boot order in cmos. Also redetect the hard disk, may be it is not finding it at all. this msg comes with a lack of the boot device in the boot order devices. balaji v

On a computer I built, the hard drive only detected a capacity of 8GB and the name of the drive was scrambled and contained odd characters. It turned out to be the IDE cable. But since you said you unplugged both hard drives, this may be a bad floppy drive cable as Tubesandwires has mentioned. This is a shot in the dark but your floppy controller or hard disk controller may be failing too. If the former is the case, you could use a USB floppy if needed. If the latter, you can use a PCI IDE Card. Every nation needs to realize that there's a God in Heaven that's one day going to have them give an account for their actions, regardless of religion.