I am trying to configure a new 100gig laptop HD to dual boot Win98se and WinXP Home on a Dell Inspiron 1100. As I have no floppy drive on the laptop, I burned a bootable CD using the original Win98se startup floppy, made 4 partitions on the new 100gig laptop hard disk using fdisk, formatted all partitions, and then attempted to install Win98se to the C partition.
All seemed to go well until I tried to install the drivers needed. I can't get the OS to recognize the G drive (CD-ROM) which is actually a DVD-CD-ROM device. Because of that, I cannot access the Win98se CD to install any drivers.
I also get errors like: Your multi-function device (Standard dual PC IDE controller) has some child devices using 32-bit drivers, others using compatibility-mode drivers.
Also, vnetbios.vxd is missing.
I have installed Win98se to a number of desktop computers over the years with no difficulty. This laptop install is not going well at all. Any insights or assistance would be appreciated. Thanks!
Does your bootable CD - based on a standard '98SE boot-floppy - actually perform like the floppy? If so... can you not: make the c: partiton bootable to a "dos" prompt (dos 7x) - via the usual "sys c: " (no " ") routine; install the standard MS-CD drivers (that are part of '98SE bootdisk in many cases). Then reboot and you would be able to access the CDROM?
If so... then you might well be away and flying high...?
Similarly - providing you can transfer/install the standard MS-CD drivers as above and then access the CD, you could copy the '98SE setup folder to the drive - to another partition (logical-drive); then run setup from there.
Another approach - via a standard PC, make the c: partition bootable; install the MS-CD drivers, and also copy the '98SE setup files across to a logical-drive. Restore drive to laptop and run setup from the drive itself (as above). You will need an adapter for the laptop drive to allow it to connect to a standard PC - and I think they do not cost many pennies?
You may well even be able to install '98SE via the standard PC; then restore drive to laptop and it will work OK - although graphic drivers will need to be changed. I'd consider this approach last... although I have installed '98SE on one system and moved the drive to another without any problems...
Sorry trvlr, but I’m not following you at all. When I booted from the CD boot disk, based on the boot floppy that came with my Win98se many years ago, I first used it to fdisk, making four partitions, then formatted each from the same boot CD, and finally started using that CD to begin the Win98se install. When I started that, I got a screen that assigned drive letter G: to the CD-ROM. I placed the Win98se CD in the drive and at the A: prompt I typed in G:\setup.exe and the installation proceeded.
Everything seemed normal with the usual re-booting of the machine as the installation continued. After entering serial numbers for the OS and assigning a name to the computer and workgroup, I eventually got to the reboot where drivers needed to be installed. That’s when I began getting error messages and could not recognize the G: drive to begin installing the drivers.
I’m not the brightest bulb in the chandelier, so perhaps what I’m offering here does not provide any additional insights. I don’t even know how I would copy these MS-CD drivers from the boot disk. Weren’t they copied when the G: drive letter was assigned prior to the actual Win98se installation?
It's been age since I installed '98 so my memory is a liittle rusty...
I don't think the drivers are installed to the drive/partition during setup; but using a standard '98SE boot-floppy (and the CD) the drivers are there when required (temporarily in RAM/in the RAM drive used in setup?) - but permanently not on the hard-drive itself.
However, I frequently used to preformat any '98 (Primary) partition - and to make it bootable to dos (either 6x - if using fat16, or 7x if using fat32) and to install the standard MSCD driver package as well.
Then ran '98 setup as per norm from the CD etc. using the CDROM drivers installed initially. Never had any problems thereafter..
This was not with any laptop however, nor was it in a situation where the CDROM was actually a DVDROM... But I think I'm right in that those MS-CD drivers work with both CD and DVDROM of recent/current vintage?
Some (not all?) '98SE boot-floppies included the MSCD.exe file; this can be run/executed and thus transfers the driver to the partition; then the CDROM (DVD in this case) is supposed to work OK...
You will need the standard edit.com util (part of most/all dos based boot-disks). Suggest you use that util in part-3 of the above guide; unless you're happy at using the copy approach?
When I get to chez-moi, in a couple of hours or so, I'll dig out Bob Bale's (et alii) routines to achive the same end; they may be slightly simpler/easier to follow? Can't access them where I am - firewall/security issues.
OK The boot floppy you used has the OLD version of Fdisk on it. You need Fdisk for disks larger than 64GB. Find it here: http://radified.com/Files/ You will need to redo the partitioning. Additionally, keep in mind that Win98 creates a RAM disk on your HDrive. This backs up all drive letters past C: by one letter. The simple way to install Win98 to a laptop without a floppy is to copy all the CAB files directly to the HD and install from there.
Incidentally - you can clearly boot this laptop from the '98 (boot-floppy copy) CD? So how exactly are you running '98 setup? Most (not all...) '98 CDs (real/genuine disks) are bootable - at least as for the full versions? Are you booting with a genuine CD and runing set up that way?
If not and you have a genuine bootable '98 CD, then boot with it and see what happens?
Otherwise cab-files to the drive (as mooted earlier and recently above by OtheHill) is one way to do it all; but you will have to get them there first.
Thanks for the informative responses. I'm a bit beat at the moment but will try to give a lucid response to your suggestions at the earliest possible time. I DO have a bootable, full Win98se CD supplied by Dell when I purchased a PIII desktop from them in 2000. I have used this CD on a number of desktops in the past to install Win98se with no problems. However, all of those machines had a floppy drive.
Oh well, perhaps with some guidance, I can get through this mess. Thanks again for the suggestions!
OK, here’s what I’ve been doing: after fdisk and formatting of the four partitions, I start the computer with the boot disk and am presented with three options: 1. start Windows 98 setup from CD-ROM 2. start computer with CD-ROM support 3. start computer without CD-ROM support.
I select the first option, type in G:, some drivers are installed with the black screen present (driver OEMCD001 unit 0), I then insert the Win98se CD, at the G: prompt type setup.exe and setup proceeds nicely. (I have even tried booting with the Win98se CD in the CD-ROM and am presented with the same three options.) Somewhere along the way, after several setup re-boots (normal in my experience of installing Windows to desktops), after entering the correct OS serial number and adjusting the time, entering the user and workgroup info, I invariably get an error message as follows: “Your multi-function device (Standard dual PC IDE controller) has some child devices using 32-bit drivers, others using compatibility-mode drivers.” There’s a lot more to it, but I did not want to bore you with it in its entirety.
I am instructed to hit any key, which I do, and the installation continues. At some point, after several additional planned re-boots, I have am instructed to install hardware. All the files must come off the Win98se installation disk, but I cannot access the G: drive nor can I find drivers anywhere on the C: partition.
That’s about it. I have no idea how a system can access a CD-ROM to install an OS but then not see it later in the installation.
I have just downloaded bootmec.exe from http://radified.com/Files/ which I assume has fdisk64. It appeared to be the file I needed. I created a boot CD from the floppy and am currently in the process of re-partitioning the 100gig HD after having removed all previous ones. I hope this works. As you can tell from the time of this post, I’m not getting much sleep tonight!
Well, it looks like this is not going to work. I downloaded the winme boot disk file, which was reported to work when nothing else will, replaced the fdisk.exe file with the one reported to be fdisk64 (which was a somewhat smaller one than the original on the me file) and did a fresh fdisk on the 100gig drive. I’m still getting an erroneous report as to drive size, with fdisk reporting the same total drive size of 29, 858 Mbytes which was observed with the original win98se boot disk that I used to start this process yesterday. Shouldn’t I be getting a report of close to 100,000 Mbytes for total drive space?
As stated earlier, when the crippled version of Win98se was booted, and I accessed Windows Explorer, each partition capacity was correctly reported, totaling the 100gigs on the drive. So, it would appear that this is indeed a 100gig drive, and for some reason, the fdisk is not reporting the correct partition/drive sizes.
Oh well, I guess after all these years of messing around with computers, I STILL don’t know what the hell I’m doing!
Sorry to hear your having so much trouble. I have no experience with the ME version of the boot disk. I just replaced the original Fdisk version with the NEW version and kept all the rest of the Win98se boot disk files. Maybe the boot file image you got from Radified wasn't the correct one. At Radified the Fdisk64 file can be DLoaded alone. Find it directly below the file you did DL. Is the drive recognised correctly in the BIOS?
I believe that the 100gig HD is being recognized by the BIOS. It indicates the drive present with the correct size.
To add the new fdisk64 file to my original Win98se boot disk (which I do NOT want to do for fear of messing it up), could I copy the boot disk files to the HD on another desktop machine, replace the old fdisk with fdisk64, and then copy all to a new floppy so as not to mess with my only original floppy copy?
In addition, the vendor I purchased this HD from has a utility designed for large hard disk installs on older laptops as conflicts might result. My Inspiron’s only two years old, but might still benefit from this utility. The utility's at: http://lib.store.yahoo.net/lib/getp... being offered by getpartsonline.com. I don't know, guess it’s worth a try.
At any rate, thanks again for the support, suggestions, and interest!
If you have a floppy drive available simply copy the original disk to a blank floppy, delete the old Fdisk file and add the Fdisk64. Only one floppy drive is required. DON'T use any utilities on the drive. What you are talking about is a drive overlay. You don't want that and it appears you don't need it either. What size partitions are you trying to create and are you creating a primary and an extended partition with three logical drives? If you use the percentage of the drive it can get confusing. For instance if you wanted to create 4 equal partitions you would select to use 25% for the primary partition. You would then select to use all remaining for the extended partition. Then when you created the first logical drive you would need to select 33% as the choice. Then for the second logical drive 50% and then the balance for the third logical drive. There is no good reason to format prior to installing Win98. Windows won't allow you to do anything until all the partitions are formatted and it will format them for you. Hope the above percentages don't throw you. The reason for the numbers is Fdisk asks what percentage of the remaining space to use for the logical drive you are creating.
I HAD created a primary partition of 5gigs for the Win98se OS, and an extended partition with three logical drives of 15, 40 and 40 gigs, D, E, and F, respectively (since removed and not yet re-partitioned). I planned on installing the WinXP OS on the D partition if and when I can get Win98se running right on C. I wanted to start with the FAT32 file system on all partitions to see how XP ran, thinking that I could always convert XP later to NTFS if needed. I understand you can’t go the other way around with XP. Once it’s NTFS, that’s it.
You are correct in respect to NTFS. You are aware that any files on the NTFS partition won't be accessable from Win98se? One of the main advantages of NTFS is the static default cluster size of 4k. This allows more efiecent use of large partitions. If you were to install XP on a smaller FAT32 partition there would be no compelling reason to use NTFS. An arguement can be made for NTFS but in your case even with a 40 GB partition the advantages aren't that great. If you were to re-evaluate the partition sizing you could gain more effiecency. I will post a schart at the end of this post showing the cluster sizes with FAT32 & NTFS. Now back to your problem of getting Win98 installed. Sometimes for whatever reason, Fdisk doesn't work correctly. If the HDrive shows correctly in the BIOS you have a few choices. One would be to try Fdisk again. Two would be to get a HDrive utility from the manufacturer of the drive and set up the partitions that way. Three would be to use a utility like Delpart to make sure the partitions are all gone and then try Fdisk64 again. Delpart can be found at Radified.com. If you go the Fdisk64 route I suggest you let Win98 format using FAT32.
Cluster sizes
for FAT32 are as follows: 512MB to 8,191MB = 4KB 8,192MB to 16,383MB = 8KB 16,384MB to 32,767MB = 16KB Larger than 32,768MB = 32KB
Sometimes during setup I have also noticed 9x OS's lose the cd/dvd drive to later reappear once the os has been fully isntalled.
If you can't get to some files jsut choose skip file, this should get you to a working(ish) desktop and have a working cd/dvd drive. Why not use your XP disc to make the partitions? You can simply create them to your sizing. 5 gig is about right and nice for 98 as long as you make one of your other partitons Fat32 for extra storage for it. 15 gig is a good enough size for all the programs your going to be putting on XP. The rest is up to you.
Once you've made the partitons, you simply cancel setup. Then you could place your bootable 98SE cd in the drive and install. Choosing skip file if your cd drive disappears. Then from within windows you could manually install devices that 98SE found but you skipped and then run the add hardware wizard for the otheres. Then install XP and from within Xp use the disk management tool in XP's Adminastrative Tools and format your other partitions, restart into 98, let it recognise the partitons and be done with it.
Well, I’ll tell ya, if I had had so much trouble completing an OS install on the two desktops I’ve built and the four or five removable master drives I’ve been swapping out over the years, I would have given this stuff up a long time ago!!! I tried making a duplicate Win98se boot diskette by copying the files to a folder on my C: drive using another desktop, pasting them onto a virgin diskette, deleting the old fdisk file, replacing it with fdisk64 and then burning a boot CD. All three attempts resulted in non-system disk errors when attempting to use them in the Inspiron. Failure! Using the original bootable CD that I’d made without the fdisk64 file continued to boot fine but did not give the correct drive size when using fdisk as it did when I started all of this a few days ago.
So, I tried using the WinXP installation disk to format the drive. It looked like it worked, but when I exited setup after the partitions had been created and installed the Win98se CD, I got warnings that there were other DOS files or some such thing on the drive. Not knowing what to do, I checked the partition sizes and found the C: partition to be 8megs!! I also had an NT partition along with the 3 FAT32 partitions - I think! It all seems a blur now. At any rate, things remain unresolved.
I was wondering, IF I can partition this drive correctly and install a crippled version on Win98se to the C: partition, could I then install WinXP to the D: partition, download all the Win98se drivers required using a functional WinXP OS, store them on the E: or F: partition, and then access them to install them to Win98se using Windows Explorer? Just a thought.
I am confused about how you created the last boot CD. Did you start with a floppy disk in a different computer? If so, why are you copying and pasting to the C: drive? All you need to do is to insert the floppy into the A: drive go to My computer> right click A:> select copy drive A: to A:. Windows will read the data, request a new floppy and write to it. After that simply delete the Fdisk file and add the New version Fdisk file. Then burn to CD from the floppy. You are losing data somewhere along the line. Are you trying to boot to that CD you created? If so, did you choose the option to create a bootable CD? I'm unclear as to EXACTLY when the non system disk error is appearing.
I didn’t know about the right click A: copy drive option. On another desktop, I inserted the original Win98se boot dikette (floppy), copied the contents to a folder I created to hold all the files, including the old fdisk.exe file, inserted a virgin floppy to the drive, then copied and pasted all the files in the C: folder to the new floppy. I then deleted the old fdisk.exe file on the floppy and copied and pasted the new fdisk64 file from my download folder on the desktop C: drive to the floppy, then burned the Boot CD.
But, however lame my process may have been, it seems I have a more fundamental problem. I think my CD burner may have crapped out. I downloaded Western Digital’s Data Lifeguard utility yesterday afternoon, which can be used to format new drives, created a boot floppy and then burned a boot CD from that. Well, turns out that the boot CD cannot be read in the Inspiron. It can’t be read by my desktops either! The floppy itself CAN be read by the desktops, so something is going wrong with my CD burner all of a sudden!!
Listen, I really appreciate the interest shown in my predicament here. You’ve already spent considerable time trying to assist. At this point, there are too many crazy things going on. I might just purchase a smaller, 40gig drive which can properly use the old fdisk.exe file on the still-functioning Win98se boot CD to at least get a proper partitioning. I’ll do that after I try to burn a Data Lifeguard boot CD at work.
Hi, This thread is so long it is difficult to determine exactly what your problem is. Win98 losing the CD drive during install is common. Some times the CD never stays in. I have been loading an old, old CD driver. The ones that used to come with all CD readers. Win will REM out the Autoexec.Bat entry and leave the Config.Sys entry. You can remove both add ons when things stabilize. Of course, in your case you will have do the installation of the CD driver from a CD. Note that Nero and Roxio etc. all have a feature to make a bootable CD in Creator Classic (Roxio) or equivalent. Maybe this will help someone with similar problems.
If so then perhaps get a usb-floppy (they cost around £15/$25-30?); run the whole routine Fdisk (via the usb-foppy - and even preformat if you wish); then run setup from a floppy + CD approach (as is one of the norms for '9x?).
Just why you are unable to make this drive boot to a dos (7x) prompt; install the standard MSCD drivers and then run the whole setup (via a '98SE - bootable - CD) is beyond me...
In effect what I think several of us are attemtping to do is to get you to the point where you have the drive boot to a dos prompt - with CDROM drivers installed; then run setup via a CD boot...? In effect to load the real-mode (M$) CDROM drivers first, and use those to run/support setup -which I have done many times....
Bob Bales site may offer a few insights to to this end:
Likewise Krystinas' approach which gets arond a single non-swappable floppy and CD problem. Although this is not your predicament... Krystinas's workaround details how to load the cdrom drivers and thus run the whole setup routine from the harddrive. It's not quite how I do it - in terms of making the drive boot to dos and loading the CDROM drivers; but it's one way and it works - to her credit.
Go to:
mesich.com; look in the "how to section"; then look for "load windows using swappable drives".
As I say, I do it slightly differently - but Krystina's approach is perfectly viable so go for it; and thus no need for me detailing my approach here...
I was also considering suggesting you reset bios to defaults too; but not sure this will have any impact. Afterwards you would need to change boot-option to either CDROM or USB initially to get the drive configured etc as above? Then as more less mooted above (in several posts by various...) once successfuly booting to dos etc... you would reset boot-option to harddrive first.... Then run set up either from the CD - you would manually clunk your way to the setup.exe on the CD; or you copy the '98 cab files - including the setup.exe to the harddrive and run setup from there.
for FAT32 are as follows: 512MB to 8,191MB = 4KB 8,192MB to 16,383MB = 8KB 16,384MB to 32,767MB = 16KB Larger than 32,768MB = 32KB"
The above is true only if you use Microsoft's software to partition/format. I'm running XP with 40GB FAT32 partitions with 4K cluster size on my PC, but I manually configured them using Seagate's software. I've done the same thing in the past with WDC HDDs too.
[quote] stanz wrote: All seemed to go well until I tried to install the drivers needed. I can't get the OS to recognize the G drive (CD-ROM) which is actually a DVD-CD-ROM device. Because of that, I cannot access the Win98se CD to install any drivers.
I also get errors like: Your multi-function device (Standard dual PC IDE controller) has some child devices using 32-bit drivers, others using compatibility-mode drivers. [/quote]
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