When I start my friends computer it starts going thro the amount of memory, cd-roms, hard drives which wastes time before going on to Windows Me, how can one stop this??? is there something in the BIOS to hide all this Thanks

You mean the detailed POST screen? Depends on the BIOS - look around for any quickboot or memory test options etc. No matter what, any time savings will be hardly worth the effort, and on occasion that info can be useful Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie!'... till you can find a rock

If it does take an unusually long time to get through the POST, there may be a problem. Normally I'd ask if there were any error or warning messages, but (from your other post) you decided to mention that: "first thing it says is Systems Hardware Abnormal press any key to continue... " Quite a few hits on Google Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie!'... till you can find a rock

There is usually a setting in the bios "quick boot" or similar. If that's already on, you can't make it boot any faster. You usually can't make what it displays go away if you don't have a mboard with a brand name system bios, but it might be a different display in "quick boot" mode if the bios is not set that way now. If you have less than 128mb of ram, increasing the amount of ram installed will definately make the computer boot faster.

Ok - I'm pretty sure I'd covered that part, but go ahead, knock yourself out, I suppose it's what? Like a compulsion with you? The RAM amount is basically irrelevant to the POST screen duration, although it could take slightly longer to count higher Also, the OP started a new post with additional info. Not unexpectedly, as per site rules, that message was removed. I did include that error message in my followup, as I tend to think that is the real issue, and likely accounts for the unreasonable delay in the machine's startup - no doubt a hardware or BIOS setting problem. As regulars here know, it can often take a while before the OP eventually reveals what is really going on. Initially they often insist on help implementing the 'solution' they've arrived at on their own (regardless of merit) ymmv - the OP appears to have lost interest (it's not even his machine) but may, after all, return Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie!'... till you can find a rock