Yes, well - laptops are notoriously difficult to work on, at least compared to desktop models. Poking around inside one of those is not something I would feel too confident in doing, and I really can't advise you on where the actual CMOS battery would be. On desktop models, it's typically near the keyboard socket (for whatever that's worth). Can you access the C: drive at all? If so, it's possible that the drive is still recognized - otherwise you would need to know what entries to use for the CMOS. That would involve physically checking the drive, either to see if those specs are on a label (possible) or else to get the make & model and search the internet. You can try this utility - just download and put it on a bootdisk & execute. If the HDD is an IDE (more or less modern) then infodisk should be able to determine its specs. Without a specific error message, it's hard to tell you what to change. That is a very early 386 with a very primitive CMOS. 98% of all statistics are made up

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I have a 386sx 16 AT motherboard form 1991, and the CMOS Battery is still good..., Any ways I am 90% certain that the battery is dead, I hade a Dell with a simalar problem. I'll chesk and see if that company still has tech support...

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You do that. 98% of all statistics are made up

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You can get a new battery here : http://www.batterysavings.com/site/1/Modelselect/7/143/1057638/default.aspx It is about $9.00 US The image is what it looks like

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guys it is beginning to look like the cmos battery is good time and date are now staying the same jboy i know you asked for specs on the puter here is some of what i could find system configuration is v4.02.01 hard disk is booting up and trying to run you can hear it when the computer is running and once you hit F10 it shows on cmos when i go to setup this for the hard drive type- 17 c- 977 hd-5 pre-300 lz-977 sec-17 size- 40 it says base memory is 640kb and that extended mem is 1024 i tried to use that infodisk but i dont know how to make it a boot disk sorry to be a pain jboy but not good with programming again thanks for all the help liz

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Right, well - if you can use or access your C: drive then those parameters are likely correct. The only reason for changing them would be if the computer doesn't 'see' the drive - the only reason for using that infodisk app would be to try and determine those parameters without having to open the computer up - you would need a bootdisk in those circumstances in order load DOS, and then run the disk program from the floppy. None of that matters if the drive is actually working. If you're still receiving errors from the CMOS, you'll need to determine just what is mismatched on your system. The CMOS battery maintains settings when the computer is without power - are you running this from the adapter or the internal laptop battery? If the CMOS battery is weak or dead, then the hardware settings & time won't be maintained once the computer is disconnected from its adapter or once the laptop battery loses its charge. From neo's link, seems like one of the fairly standard battery types - typically about $5 - $10 (CDN) depending on where you look. 40Mb is pretty decent for a machine of that vintage - plenty of room for DOS and a basic Win31 installation, but with only 1Mb of RAM, even Win31 won't run that well in 'enhanced' or '386' mode (if at all). 98% of all statistics are made up

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Win 3.1 requires 2Mb. RAM to run in 386 enhanced mode. I would reccomind 4Mb. RAM for 386 enh., 3 at min, 2Mb. for standard (but if you are planning to run standard with a 386, go with win 3.0)

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Win31 'Standard Mode' is possible with only 1Mb, depending on the system - even on a 286 98% of all statistics are made up

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I never said standard mode wasn't possible. Microsoft's min. (right from da orininal book) Standard: 286 or better proc. 640k conventional mem, 256k extended 6/9Mb. free disk space (min./recomminded) 386: 386 or better 640k conventional, 1024k extended 8/10Mb. free disk space both modes: Microsoft MS-DOS 3.1 or later

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"da orininal book" heh - whatever 98% of all statistics are made up

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ok where can i find more memory for this little guy yes jboy the laptop has been plugged in so i guess i boo booed there :) still waiting on the dos and win 3.1 to get here also jboy that infodisk zip that i download off the site you told me about had a virus attached to it that attached itself to my floppy disk boot sector got rid of it but figured I would let you know thanks again everyone for all the help liz

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liz - that site is my own webspace. The file 'infodisk.exe' was uploaded from my machine. Just to be sure, I did download the file and scanned it with ViRobot and Nod32 - not surprisingly, no virus was detected. I would be interested in seeing the exact warning that you received though - and would also suggest a you perform thorough scan of your own machine with up-to-date AV software and/or an online scan. I'm fairly certain the problem is on your end. Possibly the laptop drive is infected - boot sector virus are a bit uncommon these days. It's a good idea to use the 'write-protect' tab on a bootdisk to guard against that sort of thing (once the disk has been setup) The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing..if you can fake that, you've got it made.

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oh great another thing to fix on the little laptop where can i get a virus detector for that it jboy well glad to know it so once everything is installed i can clean it another question will that virus infect the win and dos disks or just do like you said make sure the write protects are on it thanks liz

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It's hard to advise without knowing what we're dealing with - which is why I'd requested to see the warning message. There are DOS-based scanners, such as F-Prot, but it's a bit of work setting up the floppies. IF it is an 'old' virus, odds are an old DOS scanner can deal with it. AV programs are updated to keep up with the scads of new virus being developed - even without updates, an AV scanner should be able to fix an older virus infection. It would be a good idea to scan any boot floppies to ensure that they're clean, and then open the 'write-protect' tab to prevent them being infected. Entering fdisk /mbr from a floppy boot has been known to rebuild a hard drive boot sector that's been corrupted by a virus. Of course, you'd want to use the appropriate bootdisk to your machine. It's recommended that you make sure there is no virus before installing anything. Generally, Windows virus only infect Windows files, DOS virus, DOS files - but a boot sector virus is not really a file infector as such. It may spread to other files as a method of transmission, but the payload is altering the disk boot sector. The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing..if you can fake that, you've got it made.

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boot sector a virus found junkie tried the boot disk I had used and wala there was the virus again my virus detector from win 98 found it on the disk gonna run a check on them all and clean them it says the virus detector cleaned the virus so i am hoping it is right thanks jboy for the help with this liz

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Sure thing. Junkie is a fairly old virus (1994) and can spread from floppy to hard drive by booting with an infected diskette. I'm guessing it originated from the laptop, unless your boot disk has been around for a while. If you like, you can d/l an older version of Norton Anti Virus for DOS that fits onto a floppy. Just unzip onto a *verified* virus free diskette and use it to scan your laptop (write protect the diskette after unzipping the file). If your laptop doesn't boot on its own, you'll need to unzip NAV onto a bootdisk - again, make sure it's not infected, and then set the write-protect tab. You'd run it by entering a:navdx /repair To see all of the command line options, just enter a:navdx without any parameters to see the list of switches. The definitions are from '99 - should be good enough though The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing..if you can fake that, you've got it made.

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the virus came from win95 floppies i had bought found it on the boot disk and on disk one of the floppies and then on the first floppy for internet explorer jboy do you have any idea where i can get more memory for the laptop i have done a search for memory for it but unsuccessful so far liz

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You bought infected diskettes? Sounds like quite a bargain. Just make sure to clean all of them - you may have trouble booting from them even after cleaning, hard to say. Sorry, I don't know how much luck you'll have finding memory for that - I couldn't say what kind it would even take, with a laptop that old. Some of those older modules can be just a bit expensive (at least, for what you get). The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing..if you can fake that, you've got it made.

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ok guys got the dos and win in finally but guess what it says that it is a non system disk and will not try to even start setup keep getting c:\windows\command.com is missing what am i doing wrong and how do i fix it do i have to get the battery for the cmos before it will work right or what help pretty please liz

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Ok - you need to relate what you're doing/what you've done to get this error message. I could try and guess, but it makes things simpler if I don't. A weak CMOS battery may prevent hardware settings (such as the hard drive configuration) from being saved when you power off the machine. If that's the case, you'd need to setup the CMOS every time you started the computer. The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing..if you can fake that, you've got it made.

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ok been leaving the laptop plugged in so settings are still as they were and not been changed it says at the beginning that it has a invalid configuration information please run setup so i do and not sure what the correct settings are for it jboy then it will boot from a win 95 setup disk but then gives me the c:\windows\command.com error never had a problem booting up a puter with win 3.1 and dos before but this one is giving me grief thanks for trying to help liz

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Ok - I don't know what the correct CMOS settings are for your laptop. As we discussed previously, that is something you will have to determine. If your hard drive is correctly recognized, then the 'invalid configuration' message is just something you'll have to put up with until you can straighten it out. Why are you using a Win95 boot floppy? If your goal is to install DOS622, you should be using a bootdisk for that operating system. If you have the DOS622 installation disks, the 1st floppy should be bootable. When booting from a diskette, you should end up at an 'a:' prompt. The fact that you're receiving messages regarding the command interpreter on the C: drive indicates that you are probably NOT booting from the floppy, but that the machine is trying to boot from the hard drive. I'm not sure if it's an option on your machine due to its age, but you may want to check the CMOS and ensure that the floppy drive is enabled, booting from the floppy is enabled, and that the floppy is listed as the first boot device or comes first in the boot order. Again - that's a very old machine with a fairly primitive CMOS - I can't say just what options are available on it. If you want to make the hard drive bootable (and it HAS to be setup correctly in the CMOS) then you would boot from a DOS622 diskette and enter sys c: .. once you see the message system transferred, the hard drive should now boot to a basic c: prompt. Not, strictly speaking, necessary - the DOS install disks should take care of that, but occasionally there have been problems reported. If you still experience problems, might be best to start a fresh post in the DOS forum, detailing your difficulties in order to get some fresh input. The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing..if you can fake that, you've got it made.

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well got the configuration fixed was the monitor problem which figures it boots up now and gets to the prompt but no c or a just there the other thing is found out why the dos wouldnt work i mean the disk come to find out the ones i just bought the most important one of all the first disk of dos 6.22 is gone wiped completely clean so now have to wait on the guy i bought them from to see what he is gonna do about it will keep you informed liz

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see the link above to download a different version of dos (newer, fully m$ compadible) I rin it on a 386sx-16. (Note, if you do not have a coprocessor skip rewrighting the mbr, it will still work though.) It is freeware.

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