HELP

[Dawn]

I have a packard bell computer, windows 98,all that comes up on screen is : Inset bootable media in appropiate drive.All I have is the black start up screen,nothing else shows up.Any letter or number I type shows the same message....can someone help me? Thanks

[MadDog]

Dawn,
More than likely, you have a non-bootable floppy disk in the drive. If not, then you may have a hard drive problem.

HTH

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MadDog

[shanff]

Actually that is a symptom of a system with no bootable code on the hard drive. typically means that the hard drive is empty or non existent

[DR]

Use a boot disk to start computer and see if you can access your drive. You can also use a diagnostic disk like Data Advisor to test it. You can get it at www.onstart.com (http://www.onstart.com)

[stupot71]

I have seen a client lose the bootable code of there HDD after a virus renamed it or something acnt think of the name at present

[DR]

If you have a virus in the Master Boot Record you can eliminate it as follows. Insert boot disk, type command line- [FDISK] [/MBR] without the brackets. This overwrites the MBR.

[LORE]

To go along with fdisking the MBR, do it twice. I know it sounds funny, but we have found at our bench that fdisking the MBR doesn't alway's get rid of the virus, but if you do it twice in a row, it will take care of the resident virus. just my two cents.

LORE

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We may be through with the past, but the past is not through with us.

[Garfeild_Cat]

Please do not use format if you have not done so....
The Members Lore and DR. are partially correct..

1) It sounds like either you have a non bootable floppy disk inserted.

2) Your Hard drive has "lost" its boot files.
(solution) is fairly simple
a) go to a "good computer" with a 3.5 floppy
1) format the floppy as a system disk
2) copy format.com to the floppy
3) copy sys.com to the floppy
b) move the write protect tab to "Lock" on floppy c) insert floppy into computer
d) boot computer from floppy
e) at a:\ prompt
1) type fdisk /mbr
2) reboot computer from floppy
f) at a:\ type in sys a: c:

Hopefully that will solve your problem and save you lots of time.