i'm trying to start my computer. it said "boot failure, insert boot discette in A:" so i made a boot disk. but now it's promting me for ms dos commands. the screen says

starting...

microsoft(r) windows millenium
(c)copyright mirosoft corp 1981-1999.

A:\>

what should i do from here to get windows running again?

thanks.

Check to see if your hard drive is being recognised by BIOS.

a:\scanreg/fix

Presuming it was all OK prior to the current problem...

As in Post-1, first check the drive is still being seen in the bios. If it is... then boot with your ME bootdisk and at the a:>\ prompt run the Fdisk routine - to inspect the partitioning on the hard-drive.

Providing it does show the drive intact etc.
return to the a:>\ prompt and type:

c:

and press return/enter. You ought now to be at the c:>\ prompt.

At the c:>\ prompt (presuming you get there OK) type:

dir /w/s

and press return/enter. (Note the space between dir and /w/s).

If the drive is OK... you will (ought to) see a list (in two/three columns) of what's on the drive... Check that there is still a windows folder...

If it's still there... at the c:>\ prompt type:

win

and press enter/return

All things being equal you will boot to ME. If that fails then at the c:>\ prompt type:

cd windows

and press enter/return. (Note the space between cd and windows).

Presuming you get to the windows folder OK - the screen will show/display:

c:>\windows

type:

win

and press enter/return. All things being equal (and the moon is in the 7th house etc...) you will boot to ME?

If you cannot see/find the drive in the bios... report back. If you can see it in the bios but not see it via Fdisk routine likewise post back. If you can negotiate your way to the windows folder but it will still not boot via the " win " command (no " ")... then likewise post back.

well the a:\scanreg/fix thing didn't do anything. it just said bad command. i'm not sure if the hard drive is being recognized because i don't know how to get to the BIOS. it never prompts me to hit F something or anything. when i turn the computer on, it says

auto-detecting Pri Master ... press (esc) to cancel (no clue what this is)

if the disk isn't in the a drive, it just says

searching for boot record from floppy.. not found
and not found from cdrom and scsi.

but then if the boot disk is in and i don't push anything still it goes straight to the screen in my 1st post. it goes to that screen without giving me options to hit F keys or anything else. so i maybe need to run the BIOS from dos?

thanks a bunch. i really appreciate the help.

Bios cannot be accessed (normally) from a dos prompt...

It's an option during the initial power-on stage...

When the PC powers up and starts its POST/self-test routine (aka POwerSelfTest) there will be message on the display telling you what key or combination of keys to press to enter the bios. This message maybe bottm left of screen; it may be near the top...

Usually its one of several variants - depending on manufacturer of bios etc... viz:; delete key, F1, or F2, or a combination of Alt+F1 or F2 - and so on...

Reread my earlier post about what to do once you are at the dos prompt via the bootdisk (i.e. at: a:>\ ) and follow the steps to get to c: drive etc.?