My CD drive disappeared 1

[amberlynn]

I have an older PC, with Win 98 SE. I installed a network card, and when it restarted, I received an error message "Your multifunction device (Intel 823.... Bus Master IDE Controller) has some devices using 32-bit drivers and others using compatibility-mode drivers. This configuration is not supported, so your computer has been halted to prevent corruption..."
When I continued, I no longer have a CD drive. It's not showing up in My Computer at all.
Any suggestions how I can fix this??
Thanks!
Amber

 

[kestrel1]

Not very likely, but check that the cables are correctly seated in the drive. It sounds more like a resource conflict. Inserting a PCI card shouldn't really cause a problem though.

 

[amberlynn]

I checked that the cables are connected.
If I boot into safe mode, I don't the see the CD drive in My Computer, but I do see it in device manager.
If I just boot normally, I don't see the CD drive in either places.

 

[amberlynn]

And I should also have mentioned that before Windows starts up, I get a screen that says: "Cannot find a device file that may be needed to run Windows.....dfs.vxd"

 

[kestrel1]

OK, try re-installing the network card or get new drivers for it. I think you will find that's your problem.

 

[amberlynn]

I've removed the network card and restarted.
Still no CD drive.
Windows wants to install new hardware when it's starting, but can't because the CD drive is gone.
HELP!

 

[edfair]

Parts of this story is a very common issue with 98 and intel chipsets. There isn't an .inf file in 98 to cover the chips so things don't load correctly.

You might google search for "disappearing cds" and possibly hit on the intel site where you can download the .inf.

The drivers are in 98, just the pointer is missing.

I'll try to find further info and possibly a link.

In the meantime, do you have a support CD that goes with your motherboard. The required drivers are generally there although you would need to put the driver on a floppy to get it loaded. This assuming that the SE was long enough ago that floppies were still being installed.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[edfair]

It is also possible that your machine has everything it needs already there and all that happened is that the driver corrupted.

Normal step would be to get into device manager and delete the hard drive controller. Then reboot and let it load the complete hard drive set again. But if you have issues with hardware this might wipe the system out.

One other consideration would be to do an overlay install of SE, putting the new install on top of the existing one.
Another would be to go into the registry and delete the HKLM ENUM key. This would force a reload of all device drivers on the next reboot. This usually requires about 4 reboots to get everything sorted out.

And if you are missing the .inf for the bus glue chips you will be at the same spot you are now.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[amberlynn]

I tried deleting the HKLM ENUM key.
On reboot, it went through the hardware installation, and is now prompting for the Win 98 CD, which is in the drive, but the drive still isn't detected.
*sigh*

 

[edfair]

I hate that I overlooked that. All my SE install set is on the hard drive before I start installing.

Are you on the net with the machine? If so, try a google search for "intel chipset drivers". In the first hit there is a section for .inf updates. Download it and put the .infs where instructed.

You can skip the 98 CD request up through the .inf upgrade, then reboot. That will start the glue chip identification.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[edfair]

Do you have your emergency boot disk that was called for on the original installation?

As an alternative, can you get into safe mode and create an emergency boot disk?

An EBD has cdrom support, with it enabled you can copy the install stuff off the cd onto the hard drive and have it available whether the CDROM is working or not.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[kestrel1]

You say that you removed the network card, but did you remove the drivers? Have you tried getting updated drivers from the net? A failed install of a network can cause the dfs.vxd not to be correctly registered, plus other files. You could try copying the entire win98 directory off of the CD whilst running from an emergency boot disk. have a look at this site for a boot disk:

http://www.bootdisk.com/

Then when you are asked for the windows CD point the program to the folder that you have copied from the CD. Get new drivers for your network card though. I really think that is your initial problem.

 

[BadBigBen]

I would reinstall Win98 over itself:

http://www.windows98.windowsreinstall.com/

or

http://www.onecomputerguy.com/install/win9x_install.htm

make sure to reinstall it in the C:\WINDOWS folder and not in C:\WINDOWS.000 or whatever file path appears during the reinstall process. Edit the file path to read C:\WINDOWS before you continue on.

Ben

"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."

 

[amberlynn]

Thanks all! I appreciate all the help everyone is offering!
I can get into safe mode, but can't create a boot disk because it asks for the CD.
I created a boot disk at

http://www.bootdisk.com

and started the computer up with this, but received the following message:

Windows 98 has detected that drive C does not contain a valid FAT or FAT32 partition (then goes on to list possible causes).

What does this mean?

Thanks,
Amber

 

[edfair]

try

http://www.pcnineoneone.com/howto/filesystems1.html

for the basic information.

Your errormessage indicates that you may have a drive overlay loaded. Drive overlays modify the filesystem attributes so they can pack more data onto the hard drive than the FAT16 or FAT32 systems can.

Some versions of FAT can divide your hard drive where the smallest part you can use is say 32K. An overlay modification might change that to say 8K. So if you were using little files a system with 8K minimum size could store 4 times as much as one with 32K minimums.

This doesn't help get the system back up. That is going to take a few hours of thought.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[edfair]

On the assumption we are dealing with a drive overlay I would suggest working through the underlying DOS to get the CD working long enough to transfer the operating system install files to the hard drive. This isn't hard but involves several steps using DOS and temporary changes in several files that will need to be changed back afterwards. Are you comfortable using command line operations?

The easiest way to get the computer operating again is doing a total reinstall. But that will end up discarding everything you have on it. You would lose any data and would have to reinstall programs. If there is nothing of value on it, and provided you have all your software install stuff, this would be the repair of choice.

And before we start will you post the contents of your config.sys and autoexec.bat files.

 

[kestrel1]

You could transfer all your data to another HD from safe mode & then do a complete re-install. possibly your best bet.

 

[wahnula]

amberlynn,

Not fluent in 98, but maybe someone who is could tell you if upper & lower filters that are present in XPs registry are also present in Win98, We had a similar problem here a little while back where that was the solution:

http://www.tek-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=1356640&page=1

Just trying to help, sorry if it does not apply.

wahnula

 

[amberlynn]

Thanks Edfair,
I am comfortable working with command line operations in DOS.
It is important that I don't lose the data that is on the hard drive.

The contents of AUTOEXEC.BAT :

@ECHO OFF
SET SOUND=C:\PROGRA~1\CREATIVE\CTSND
SET MIDI=SYNTH:1 MAP:E MODE:0
SET BLASTER=E620 T6
--(There was about 20 blank lines in here that I removed)

REM [CD-ROM Drive]

Rem TShoot: rem - By Windows Setup - C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\MSCDEX.EXE /D:OEMCD001 /L:d
C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\MSCDEX.EXE /D:OEMCD001 /L:d

REM [Display]

REM MODE CON: COLS=80 LINES=25

REM [Sound, MIDI, or Video Capture Card]

REM SOUNDTST.COM

REM [Mouse]

REM MOUSE.COM

REM [Miscellaneous]

REM FACTORY.COM


Contents of CONFIG.SYS:

device=c:\windows\himem.sys
device=c:\windows\emm386.exe ram
DOS=HIGH,UMB

Thanks,
Amber

 

[edfair]

Your 98SE was installed on top of MSDOS. The CONFIG.sys should have originally had a CDROM driver referring to the same pointer as in the Autoexec.bat.

First step is using [F8] on bootup to get into command mode (same way as getting to safe mode).
attrib -s -h -r msdos.sys
edit msdos.sys to install 3 lines to enable the menu
after the BootGui line add the following
BootMenu=1
BootMenuDefault=2
BootMenuDelay=15
[ALT]+[f]

[ALT]+[x]

This gives the boot menu for 15 seconds defaulting to bootlog version. Test it to make sure you can get to command line easily. You can shorten the delay if you wish to keep the menu active after we are done.

At command line after reboot:
rename autoexec.bat autoexec.org
rename config.sys config.org
md loader where we are going to put the bootdisk files.
put the bootdisk in for the copy
xcopy a:*.* c:\loader\ /s /e /v spaces between switches

copy c:\loader\autoexec.bat c:\ /v
copy c:\loader\config.sys c:\ /v

edit config.sys so anything called comes from \loader

the critical ones are in config.sys under the [CD] section
and should look like:
device=c:\loader\himem.sys
device=c:\loader\oakcd.sys etc.

when done, and exited out reboot
should get into the config menuing system, using [F8] should give choices, step by step would be good

as the drivers load there will be one that finds the CDROM
make note of where it is.

When things are loaded you should be at c:\
md sein
md sein\win98

move to the CD and your SE install CDROM
copy *.* c:\sein /v
cd win98
copy *.* c:\sein\win98 /v

This is a duplicate of how the CD is set up, overkill but you'll be more comfortable with it this way

move back to the c: drive
cd \
rename config.sys config.bd
rename autoexec.bat autoexec.bd

SE in an original install would have config.sys and autoexec.bat as blank files (really 0 length) but easier to create them as short ones:
copy con config.sys one space [F6]
copy con autoexec.bat one space [F6]

in theory, rebooting will bring up 98 with hardware detection working, when it asks for the path to the CD you point it to c:\sein\win98

You may still need to get to the Intel site for the .inf upgrade for your IDE glue chips. You'll know if the CD isn't visible after the SE is back together.

Hope I haven't missed anything.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.