WIndows 98SE shows instead of XP Home Edition 2

[HelpMePleaseTek]

Hello everyone!
Hope I can get some assistance here as this is far beyond anything else I've encountered.

I'm upgrading a computer system from ATA to SATA drives (more complicated than that, if and when you require additonal information I'll be happy to provide as much technical detail to assist you!)
I have a SATA drive 600 GB WD Raptor brand new with my old ATA drive ( filled up 250 older GB drive with many partitions to letter V), transferred to it (it has a BSOD error for another reason when the transfer was done to save the data).
Upon reinstalling back in the computer and turning on instead of my usual four system Microsoft menu (four XP systems on the drive so solution can't be to erase a partition and do a parallel installation by the way as I have fully four OS on the drive) I saw something from my long long ago past, the Windows 98 SE logo saying that there was "no keyboard and no mouse" attached.
I worked hard to get a workaround and finally got a keyboard attached (older wired style to USB) which managed to trick the program into proceeding to the next screen. It now says "click" ok to proceed. And guess what? There is no keyboard control, no mouse control because it may appear that the only thing to work on the computer is the old style PS/2 type of round connectors! The new computer with both ATA and SATA connections on the MB, has only USB (2.0), while my older computer had only PS/2 with ATA controller card. Windows 98SE does not recognize USB until it is loaded and I can't get to the loaded page without clicking "ok" and I can't get the arrow to move. I even tried my old PS/2 keyboard and mouse with modern-day adaptors (belkin and staples) to convert to USB and the drivers of course do not load until the program loads and Windows 98 does not have the basic requirements to operate anything until then!)
And the purpose of all my efforts is of course is to get the Windows 98SE to operate for a few minutes, long enough for me to re-upgrade back to my XP Home Edition (no disrespect to my old 98, but I upgraded all my 98's to XP's long ago.
Which brings me to why this is occurring....I'm at a total loss but again I'm trying to restore my four XP systems with over 150 programs (most of which can't be reloaded as they have propritory information/data storage or product keys that the websites have gone done in the years since, so reinstalling is impossible!)
One more curious bit of information you should know, and no one warned me back in the 1990s' or 1980s not to do this, I only have one "full" microsoft edition, Windows 3.0! Everything else (3.1, 3.1.1, WIn 95A, B, C, 98 and 98SE and of course XP Home Edition are all the upgrade versions, so this is complicating things. I did not install or make any partiitons without assistance of others or Partition Commander 10 etc. so they all were functioning when this original problem occured. The question that no one at Dell (the maker of the current circa 2007 computer) is able to fathom why, is why it would drop back down to Windows 98SE?
Let me know if I left out anything. I checked out a number of items on this forum and found interesting items. Long ago, Microsoft alerted me to the "memory" problem of older OS's so while I had 4GB SDRAM fully loaded on the 2007 Optiplex 320 Dell computer, I reduced it to one of my older 1 GB chips while trying to fix the BSOD problem caused by inaccurate Dell manual information.
Thanks for reading this far everyone! I really apprciate the help and advice!
HelpMePleaseTek

 

[goombawaho]

There will no worse feeling than finding out you cloned an empty drive onto the drive you wanted to get an image of!

Been there, done that. Feels like you locked your keys in your car and got punched in the stomach at the same time.

Aren't you still only going to end up with a drive that has four partitions, three which are locked somehow and inaccessible, and one usable partition that is basically empty?

Hence me advice (humbly admitting to have NOT read any of the whole posts) to start over with a clean disk, an O.S. that works and slaving the drive to recover any data. Of course programs would be lost. This is one of the bigger messes I've ever seen.

 

[edfair]

I assume, understanding the ramifications of that statement, that windows would do a repair and overcome the lockout if the partitions were isolated from each other. I do so admitting that I've never had to work around a WGA lockout.

Agreed, a mess. Happens when you follow Microsoft's primrose path of upgrades. Or perhaps I'm just reacting to their 30 year history of the same types of issues.

One bright note resulting from the death of a customer. I no longer need to worry about hardware compatbilities with the 1982 batch and config files that were ticking time bombs with his software.

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

 

[vacunita]

Having read all this, and yes even the very long wall of text. I'm still at awe at how the OP managed to get to this place.

In any case, I think running an in-place install over the foobared installations should allow him to enter a new product key for each one and reactivate the locked out installations, without loosing documents or installed applications.

However, once that is done and the installations are in working order, I would start consolidating applications into a single clean installation, and try to work out an aggressive backup strategy.

There is none here to blame but the OP with that contrived updating strategy and setup.


----------------------------------
Phil AKA Vacunita
----------------------------------
Ignorance is not necessarily Bliss, case in point:
Unknown has caused an Unknown Error on Unknown and must be shutdown to prevent damage to Unknown.

Web & Tech

 

[HelpMePleaseTek]

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YES, RIGHT YOU ARE to both items quoted above! (Dell did the backup process also on my last open ATA Drive "just in case" but I'm afraid to play with it as I'm sure it will show Windows 98 too!) But then... if I get the brand new 600GB one back to Windows XP on that "one" parallel OS, that mostly empty XP system can be safely remotely accessed by Windows/Microsoft Dell and others to "fix" the other three partitions !!! Hopefully they were telling me truths and not leading me on a "wild goose chase" to mollify my calls (if you think my writing is long, think how my phone calls to help desks must appear!)


Yes, help me please getting around this problem----can't convince those who are believers in their own views and who lack my (our) knowledge of computers/programs/products in this field. (Dale Carnegie said something to paraphrase: "A man who is convinced against his will, is of the same opinion still!")


My short reply is (without listing all my partions? do you need that?---see below) is a question back to you as to why is my first lowest Logical Drive C (the one that has the MAJORITY 100 plus of programs on it) became the first drive listed in the ATA HDD and locked by WGA? Yet the paralel XP Drive "P " Yes I"m that type of guy, P for parallel, OS at ---get this--- 100 GB up the Extended partition! is not listed as bogus? and not locked all the years I continued to use the defective computer! (Partial answer is in how MSFT handled the WGA program after the lawsuits began, changing it over to another version so my parallel no longer locked, but they claimed I had to change the MB or else the others will lock within their 3 hr time limit).

So all three others XP OSs are listed as locked and the drives are locked as "hidden" partitions from my Partition commander and say they have "No OS" on them! So of course I can't see anything on the drives and can't move or resize them and create another partiiton or take a chance and erase one, which one is which? Not clear! But the "size" is listed and locked in that size! See some more notes I'll post later on if anyone still thinks they are useful to get out of this problem about WGA ....will give more info

My BIG worry is the IMAGING of the Drive!

As you are correct about my fear of doing the wrong drive ..why? Norton Ghost does not say which drive is which! and I purposely!! got different sized drives so that I can see it says copy 300 to 600 ....easy right? But according to the plan, if I use outside Drive USB or Firewire to the MB, I will only see the sizes of the drives as 300 300 600 and which "300" is the correct one to transfer? Will only find out by doing it and even when done, still can't figure out if that then changes the order of display now that it has a OS on it! The one with Professional XP on it I"m worried I'll do something wrong as its the only computer I can use for windows-type Word Processing else I do not have another home (vs work) PC. Only have "macs" to create things that others need a PC for.

BUT
my 300 GB that works (only one ) with XP Professional on it is 300 GB and if i hook the two 300s' in the mother board shows them but does not differenate it in any way so out they went I can't use both and I happen not to have any more empty ATA drives!

Had to go shopping to look, but I wanted a 450 GB size one and waited 6 months looking for one finally had to get the 600 BFG (oh yes too much detail) but was looking for a different size purly for copying purposes when I save using Norton Ghost I would know where I"m copying from and to!

You're right! Who do I find to help me "Staples" as my Gamer guy no longer works for the place and I already contacted all people i knew in my area about this problem and 99% are so new they did not even know enough about Windows 98 to say they would even "look" at my drive, just said "not me"!!

So I'm really loking for help here. someone loaded in Ghost for me (I can do it but I got someone but they really liked the Nova Backup, personally, but they did Ghost anyway for relative with the laptop I was assisting as I"m currently using their laptop for Email (how do you think I"m doing this with a broken PC desktop anyway?)

Thanks to all of you who read again this far!

HelpMePleaseTek


P.S. Trying without printing the image for a representational Technical Data for those who might help me better with this: While not printing out my personal drive listings here is what a printout of the drive taken before this all occurred usually appeared like to Avanquest's Partition Commander 11's vew:

Local (Logical) Disk
Partitions
Q:
R:
C: each one with an XP "OS" on them that is "hidden" and does not read as an OS.

(Yes I wondered why they always come up in this order without C as the root one but in another program I think it looks like my Norton Ghost 15 (I filled in now the blanks on my prior posting!) on a printout page, I can visually see the entire drive and C is in the "Drive 0" bottom most position)

Extended Partitions D: through V: (after V: are my opticals)

This includes "P:" for the one working XP Home Edition which does not work now that I only get Windows 98 screen up.

 

[BadBigBen]

OMG... I too read the long long post, and I wont mention S&M, but that is what it sounds like at this stage...

@HelpMe... in the last post, to explain why C does not show up in the first line, is that when you boot, the partition that the running OS is on is always C: (at least in XP)...
now what does that tell you, that you booted to either a second drive in the system, or you booted into the third partition on the first drive that Windows sees...

as to why it starts in W98, is that the START CODE (MBR) points to the W98 (DOS) files and not to NTLDR, and that the drive is still under FAT32 as the FileSystem...

it might be a simple FIXMBR and FIXBOOT type of deal here, but with out the drives in front of me, or the *cough* Dell, any advice could be totally off...

but I agree with most here, that in lieu of your hardware skills, it would be more prudent for you to seek the help from a professional...

I must also state that I've never seen a mainboard that does not allow the mix of PATA and SATA drives, then again I don't deal with Dells...

I'm almost hesitant to ask, where in the world are you located at?

Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[kjv1611]

then again I don't deal with Dells...

Yeah, some Dell BIOS checks are insane in how the hold the system up for something that has no affect on system stability whatsoever. Just some programmer apparently thought it should be a requirement. How annoying. However, I know I've seen this in places other than Dell. I do just happen to know of a recent item with Dell. Check this out:

http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/desktop/f/3515/p/19457754/20145886.aspx

I'm not involved there, but got curious when I saw the message on a screen at work. Since I'm not part of the helpdesk, I just notified the helpdesk folks, and moved on.

"But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Corinthians 15:57

 

[BadBigBen]

Interesting read there KJV...

Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"