HELP!?!

I am a beginner...

I formatted drive C:/ to take off Windows 95. When I rebooted the computer the screen says "Invalid System Disk Replace the disk, and then press any key".

I don't have a disk in anything. What do I have to do to make that go away.

Note: Computer is a Packard Bell Legend 2051.
This is a 'found' computer and worked fine, until I started deleting files and erased Windows 3.11. I would like to Windows 3.11 back in, I installed Windows 95 thinking it would work, I ran into alot of issues I didn't know how to deal with. I am pretty sure DOS is still intacted.

P.S. Computer had no disks whatsoever, However, a friend of mine is bidding on E-bay for a complete/unopened package DOS/3.11. I won't know for about 4 days to see if I get it.

Thank You

Jeff Wilson

You really like to do things the hard way it seems.

That message means that your hard drive is no longer bootable - not too surprising, since you have now erased everything on it

Nothing is "intacted" at the moment.

May as well wait until you receive the installation disks, then install DOS & Windows (in that order)

I'm not saying there should be a capital punishment for stupidity, but why don't we just take the safety labels off of everything and let the problem solve itself?

Thank You jboy.

Jef

Well, you might have gotten away with just fixing the command.com/version problem and kept it going, but you'd still want to replace the deleted Win3xx (and perhaps other files). At this point, you're not a lot further behind after formatting - things go more smoothly when you have the installation disks..

If you encounter any problems installing, post back here or in the DOS forum (whichever is more applicable)

I'm not saying there should be a capital punishment for stupidity, but why don't we just take the safety labels off of everything and let the problem solve itself?

Well, since you don't have anything to do for a few days, boot up with the bootdisk I sent. Let me know if it sees the cdrom.

hi - hi have the same problems but dont have any disks full stop. I have know idea where i can get a 'system disk' or rescue/recovery disk that packard Bell's are meant to come with.

Any Ideas Please?

P.S - i tried putting the Win XP disk in and it says remove media or something like that. It was a Win 98 setup bfore i deleted it.

You might want to start a new thread in the windows 95/98 forum as not many people will see this.

But in general if you don't have a restore disk that came with the computer you can use a regular bootdisk and the OS installation cd to install the OS.

i have the same problem i got that message.
I tried to put the boot up floppy in it
gfave me these choices

1:setup using cd-rom drive
2:start up with cd-rom drive
3:start up without cd-rom drive

I got the "c:\" but i didnt know what to
type in.

It depends on what you need to do. You get the 'invalid system disk' message because the system files aren't being found on the drive you're booting from. Sometimes that means there's nothing on the drive and sometimes it means there's a problem with just the system files.

If you type dir/p at the c:\> prompt you'll get a listing of the file and directories on the drive. If nothing shows up then you need to install an operating system.

If a windows directory shows up there then maybe it's just the system files. Go back to the a:\> prompt and type sys c: and enter. This will refresh the system files on the hard drive. If the sys command found no system files on the hard drive then it transfers the dos system files from the bootdisk to the HD. If that happens the system will now boot to a c:\> prompt but not to windows.

If it sees the system files on the drive it won't replace them with the dos version. Sometimes the refresh allows a normal boot to windows afterwards.

Oh, this is the 3.1 forum. So assuming you're running 3.1 the system files are dos. If you're going to run the sys command, just make sure the disk you're booting from is the same OS version as is on the HD.