I just assembled a computer with a AMD K-6 500MHz, on a M599lmr board. I installed a CD-ROM, floppy drive, and maxtor HD. Now, I can't load an OS. When I turn the computer on, everything lights up (like it should) but the floppy drive light just stays on. I put a boot disk in the floppy but it's not found. I just get something like this: Searching for boot record on floppy...Not found. Drive is not ready. Insert disk and hit any key when ready. The whole time now, the floppy drive light has been on, but it has made no attempt to actually access the disk as far as I can tell. At least it sure doesn't sound like it has. I unplugged the power from the floppy drive, and of course, the green light doesn't come on, but I get that same message. This makes me think it's not actually trying to find the boot record from the floppy at all. I don't think my floppy drive is the problem. I've tried 2 different drives and two different cables, all with the same results. Is there a hardware issue with the motherboard? The onboard floppy controller? Thanks. Johnny.

You have the cable on backwards on your floppy drive. When the light stays on the cable is backwards. Red strip on cable goes to pin 1 on the mother board and floppy drive. If this does not fix the problem then I would say you have a bad cable or a bad floppy drive

I agree 100% ScottS above. Connect your cable correctly and give us some feedback.

It's upsidedown, gotta agree with these guys. That should do the trick. Don't worry I've done it before also. =) We all do.

See above and Note: u prob have pin1 right on the drive side but not on the MB side.

Ok, you guys were right. I fixed that. But now I get the "Invalid system disk" error when I put anything in there. I'm trying to use a Win98 boot disk. I've also tried a Maxtor disk (I do have a Maxtor drive). Any suggestions? Thanks. Johnny.

To answer your last problem. If you stuck those diskettes in the drive while the cable was on wrong you could have destroyed the floppies. I would find a bootable floppy that you did not use and that has been tested on another PC and see if you can boot it.