Hi,

I just upgraded to Win 98 se (from 95) on a laptop. I have one problem: it freezes halfway on boot (the fading blue strip on the boot screen at the bottom stops). My AUTOEXEC and CONFIG.sys are clean, I do not think they are the problem. About once in 5 times it starts up correctly.

Please help, it's urgent!

thanks!!

Well, on one of the occasions that it does start up, click Start, choose Run, then type msconfig, hit enter, and take a look at the startup tab to see what is loading automatically at boot, and get rid of whatever isn't essential.
It could also be a driver issue, so you could hit the F8 key repeadedly while it's booting up until a menu appears, and choose step by step confirmation. Doing this, you will have to hit "Y" on every driver that loads so you can see where exactly you're getting hosed up. I used to have a 98 machine that would freeze for a good 15 seconds or so at the splash screen while it loaded the Network Card driver, then it would continue as normal.

It doesnt freeze when it gets into windows, so the Startup tab in msconfig isnt going to help.

It boots if I answer Y to everything in step by step confirmation. :(

*sigh*

I understand that it doesn't freeze when it gets to windows. From what you described it sounds like it's freezing at the splash screen. All kinds of things are being loaded in the background at that point, possibly programs and utilities that are set to automatically start at boot. That's why I mentioned it. Also - Do you have anti-virus software on there? Try uninstalling it, and see if it boots normally.

Bro, what type of machine is this ? Cause I once worked with a computer like this and hear numerous complaints about the same problem with similiar machines. The problem was: the motherboard sucked. Like those old packard bells, they would freeze up all the time even though the system was FRESHLY installed and a brand new hard drive. That's one possibility.

Secondly, raincheck is right. Get rid of all your startup programs because all that crap gets loaded in the bootstrap which is on that silly splash screen.

What worked for me on that other machine to get it booted was that I totally unplugged it from the back. Let it sit for 15 seconds, plugged it back in and let it boot up. Usually it worked. Cold boots worked and warm boots SUCKED.

--hope this helps--