I’m tiring to resurrect an old 386 for a friend. I have a clean install of DOS 6.20 on the machine now. My problem is that when installing MS Windows 3.1 the installation hangs up at 48% on Disk 1. At this point the install requests “Insert Disk 1 and hit any key to continue”. The system will not recognize disk 1 after this. Hitting a key only returns to the message. Removing and reinserting the disk has no effect. Any suggests?

Go to EBAY and buy Windows, many used and unused available. It is always wise to make a backup of original floppies when new.

You can try scandisk or similar on the diskette, but don't hold out much hope (nothing to lose either though)

Resist the temptation to close your request for help with semantically-null questions like “Can anyone help me?”

Report Offensive Follow Up For Removal

Thanks to both for the suggestions. Sorry to say but, I'm using the backups. Do I remember correctly that when the installation is complete Windows asks for Disk 1 and that it would over write a file as a form "copy protection"? I will also give Scandisk a try.

I'm pretty sure that is not the case with Win31 - generally wise to use the 'write protect' tab on installation disks to avoid any alteration, but if Scandisk needs to fix something, that's a different case

Resist the temptation to close your request for help with semantically-null questions like “Can anyone help me?”

Report Offensive Follow Up For Removal

I sent you a copy of disk1

You can lead a horse to water but,you can't make it google!!!

Thanks RobertJ! I'll keep a look out for that.

Here's a good way to install win3.1. From DOS make a dir on your hard drive like Windisks and subdirectories Disk1, Disk2, etc. Next copy your installation disks to these subdirectories. Check that the file counts on the installation disks and Diskx dirs are the same. Then run setup from the Disk1 dir, but choose the CUSTOM option. All this does is that you can monitor the installation. What is nice is that now you can point to the disk images on your hard disk when asked to "insert disk". This should go very fast and should avoid hangs.

I have found that a slight flaw in your disks or floppy drive can cause the install to hang and unfortunately Win3.1 [mostly] makes you start the install from scratch if it hangs.

hello

i think the windows installation does not work with expanded memory, so if you use a memory manager try to deactivate it. maybe it helps :> or i maybe told s---, i do not know