I just recently upgraded the new AOL with the anti-virus added in and after I downloaded the anti-virus from mcafee and when it rebooted the scandisk came up and about halfway through it froze so I shut the computer off tried again this time cancelling the scandisk and it asked for my login and password I cancelled it out and before it loads the main screen it freezes everytime right there. Safe mode doesnt work either so I tried the system restoration kit and it tells me that this CD will only work on a gateway computer(which I have) so nothing seems to be working for me. And I cant find my windows ME startup disk so if theres any way I could possibly get it from somebody to see if it will help that would be great. So if anyone has any information that would be nice...thanks Jacob

for a program that will make a EBD, start up floppy go to www.bootdisk.com. It is a program, do not just copy it to the floppy. Have you added or changed any hardware in the comp, if you have that might be the reason the restore cd will not work.

Download a diagnostic diskette from the hard drive manufacturer.Some tools are available to recertify the drive and possibly avoid any Windows setup but in this case when scandisk freezes in the middle of its work it means a problem with the drive(not necessarily a physical one that requires changing the drive).You can write zeros to the drive(this is a pseudo formatting:it is safe but the drive data is erased) and use fdisk to partition followed by format on all the partitions like you normally do.You may have a boot virus that no program can remove readily(like fdisk that does not erase the boot sectors completely).If you don't find a diagnostic diskette to write the zeros try KillDisk boot floppy program(the name is a little strong but the program simply writes zeros to all drive sectors including the boot sector ones).You can also get from kzin.com a similar program called diskzero(copy it to a boot disk) that works from a dos prompt.Change 0 for 1 if you have a second physical hard drive.All these programs have a safety feature that requires you approve the job before it is started.From a dos prompt: diskzero 0 -z http://www.kzin.com/bootsec/ http://www.killdisk.com/ Good luck.

yes, i was gonna fdisk and format but I wasnt sure if i should yet...but also today my parents bought windows xp home edition upgrade so i tried that then I accept the aggreement then it goes to a screen and says no previous version of windows are installed please use the windows xp home edtion(full version cd) so thats what tempted me to just erase everything and try over but yeah ill try the killdisk and all that and see where it goes from here...thank you Jacob