Earlier I was havign trouble getting my cpu to work the newly installed Second hard drive. Well Ive gotten over that and now another problem. My cpu was working fine until i shut it down. Now when i try to start I get a Windows protection error. You must restart. I can only start in safe mode. I just added new memory and the second hard drive. My cpu for the longets time has displayed an error message says "Cannot find a device file that may be needed to run Windows or a Windos application. The windows registry or SYSTEM.INI file refers to this device file, but the device file no longer exists. If you deleted this file on purpose, try unistalling the associated application using its uninstalled or setup program. If oyu still want to use the application associated with this device file, try reinstalling that application to replace the missing file. vnetware.386" Again it has read this message for a long time as a result of my gf deleting some stuff by accident, but Windows always loaded fine. Somehow could me making the recent upgrades be making it a problem now? The memory I added one was PC 100 and one was 133, is that a problem? And what can I do...again I can boot up in Safe Mode but thats it. Thanks

Try reducing the memory to what it was before you added any. See if you get the protection error after that.

Just tried removing the memory to what I had before, still no luck same error. Mike

You might try restoring a previous registry. To do that startup the computer. Before the OS starts to load start tapping the F8 key. A menu should come up. Choose 'command prompt only'. At the c:\> prompt type: scanreg/restore and enter. Choose a registry to restore with a date that precedes the problem. If that doesn't fix it you may need to install windows over itself. For the missing file error, open up system.ini with something like sysedit. If you can locate the line attempting to load vnetware.386, disable or remove it.

Mer - This might seem silly, but is there anything on the new drive yet? You don't have to be realistic to be cynical, but you DO have to be cynical to be realistic!

No I havent had a chance ot put anything on my new hard drive yet. I was up all night trying to figure out what was causing the problem and whats funny is when I m in safe mode and go to start>run>msconfig> On the general tab if I uncheck Process Autoexec.bat, and uncheck Load startup group items, and then click the Startup tab and leave some programs unchecekd it will start up normally. But with the same info checked, if I shut it down the next time it wont start properly. Ill try those suggestions. Thanks

Reverting back to an old registry date worked!!!! Thank u so much. How did the registry get changed in the first place? All i did was add memoery and the hard drive. I ran sysedit but I dont see what is trying to laod vnetwar. But thanks for the help.