CD Drive and Windows 98

  • Thread starter Thread starter Chris S
  • Start date Start date
C

Chris S

Hi,

I need some advice about a computer that has problems.
The computer isn't mine, I am trying to fix it for them.

The issue is that the computer won't start Win98 as a file is missing or
corrupt, it boots to MSDOS.
I tried copying the file from another machine but I had an idea it wouldn't
work.
The result was I needed to reinstall Win 98.

The person didn't have a boot disk, so I made one from another computer.
When I start the machine with the boot disk in the computer doesn't seem to
look at the A: drive or the D: Drive but tries to boot from C:

Probably an issue with the BIOS.

So I manually changed to A: drive and ran the Autoexec.
This worked however I can't get CD support in, hence I can't install Win98,
it says the driver is for a generic CD and mine needs another driver, this
is a Liteon drive.

So do I get a Liteon driver?
Or is there some other way of getting the CD drive to work in MSDOS?
If I get the driver how would I incorporate it onto the boot disk?

Any help would be good.

Thanx.
 
My adivice would to be to turn it onn with the cd off and let it know its
not there then reconnect it and makesure it reads it in doss it has to know
its there to use it
 
Hi,

I need some advice about a computer that has problems.
The computer isn't mine, I am trying to fix it for them.

The issue is that the computer won't start Win98 as a file is missing or
corrupt, it boots to MSDOS.
I tried copying the file from another machine but I had an idea it wouldn't
work.
The result was I needed to reinstall Win 98.

The person didn't have a boot disk, so I made one from another computer.
When I start the machine with the boot disk in the computer doesn't seem to
look at the A: drive or the D: Drive but tries to boot from C:

Probably an issue with the BIOS.

So I manually changed to A: drive and ran the Autoexec.
This worked however I can't get CD support in, hence I can't install Win98,
it says the driver is for a generic CD and mine needs another driver, this
is a Liteon drive.

So do I get a Liteon driver?
Or is there some other way of getting the CD drive to work in MSDOS?
If I get the driver how would I incorporate it onto the boot disk?

Any help would be good.

Thanx.
Click to expand...

Exactly what says "the driver is for a generic CD and (mine) needs another
driver"?

You're aware that the Liteon drive (if even slightly modern) will boot the
Win98 CD? That is, providing the machine isn't over (roughly) a decade
old. Just throw in the CD and boot to it.

If you really insist on booting to a floppy, DO boot to the floppy. Don't
boot the HDD then run the autoexec, boot to the Win98 setup floppy. If
that doesn't work, if you boot to it and still no access to the CD, then
go to Liteon's website and download the DOS driver. If they no longer
have a DOS driver for it (if you really needed a different DOS driver it
must be a quite old drive) then Google search for that driver.

However, when hardware is instable, it's quite easy to see a system
attempt to boot Win98 (or whatever OS) and claim there's a problem like a
mising file or other messages like you've seen. If files are suddenly
corrupt or missing you ought to be wondering WHY that is... possibly you
have a virus and ought to look into a DOS antivirus scanner, or perhaps
the HDD is failing and you should run the HDD manufacturer's diagnostic
floppy to test the drive. Generally speaking, files don't just become
missing unless some(thing) deletes them or there's a hardware failure of
some sort. Reinstalling Win98 in some of these situations may not help.

If there's room on the HDD, copy the Windows CD's /win98 folder, contents
to a folder (why not name it "win98") on the hard drive. It'll reinstall
faster and you won't need to use the CD anymore, and if multiple
reinstalls are necessary you already have the files on the HDD... though
if you think you'll be needing to format the drive for a fresh start,
you'd want those Win98 files on a different partition.
 
kony said:
Exactly what says "the driver is for a generic CD and (mine) needs another
driver"?

You're aware that the Liteon drive (if even slightly modern) will boot the
Win98 CD? That is, providing the machine isn't over (roughly) a decade
old. Just throw in the CD and boot to it.

If you really insist on booting to a floppy, DO boot to the floppy. Don't
boot the HDD then run the autoexec, boot to the Win98 setup floppy.
Click to expand...

I have tried to boot it from the floppy, it seems to ignores it, hence me
then going to A drive to run the autoexec.
That is where it then says the generic driver won't work.
This was made from a start up disk downloaded from the net.
So I made a start up disk on another computer, the same thing, it won't
access the drive.
So when I am in dos and I put the Win 98 disk in I can't change drives to
access it.
If
that doesn't work, if you boot to it and still no access to the CD, then
go to Liteon's website and download the DOS driver. If they no longer
have a DOS driver for it (if you really needed a different DOS driver it
must be a quite old drive) then Google search for that driver.

However, when hardware is instable, it's quite easy to see a system
attempt to boot Win98 (or whatever OS) and claim there's a problem like a
mising file or other messages like you've seen. If files are suddenly
corrupt or missing you ought to be wondering WHY that is... possibly you
have a virus and ought to look into a DOS antivirus scanner,
Click to expand...



I had thought of this.
Been into BIOS and the virus scan is switched off, if I switch it on would
it say if the problem is down to a virus?
r perhaps
the HDD is failing and you should run the HDD manufacturer's diagnostic
floppy to test the drive. Generally speaking, files don't just become
missing unless some(thing) deletes them or there's a hardware failure of
some sort. Reinstalling Win98 in some of these situations may not help.
Click to expand...

Would switching on SMART indicate a problem with the HDD

If there's room on the HDD, copy the Windows CD's /win98 folder, contents
to a folder (why not name it "win98") on the hard drive.
Click to expand...

I can't, I can't access the CD drive
 
I have tried to boot it from the floppy, it seems to ignores it, hence me
then going to A drive to run the autoexec.
Click to expand...

What, exactly, did you do when you "tried to boot it from floppy"?
Before anything else, get the floppy-boot working. In the bios you should
have a screen that shows the boot order, where the floppy should be set
before the IDE, hard drive.
That is where it then says the generic driver won't work.
Click to expand...

So there's a prompt on the screen that reads "The generic driver won't
work." ?

Exact detail of error messages is important.
This was made from a start up disk downloaded from the net.
Click to expand...

A Windows 98 Startup disk? The minor details such as this, are important.
You know what you have but we don't.
So I made a start up disk on another computer, the same thing, it won't
access the drive.
So when I am in dos and I put the Win 98 disk in I can't change drives to
access it.
Click to expand...

Most likely the problem is simply that you can't just switch to the floppy
drive after booting to the HDD, then run autoexec... The Config.sys file
on the boot floppy is where the CDROM driver gets loaded, so you must have
both the config.sys and all the referenced CDROM drivers available on the
boot device, else edit the config.sys on the HDD to mirror the one on the
floopy but with the path to the CDROM driver files.

In other words, set the bios to boot from the floppy and you probably
won't have to do anything more, or set it to boot from the CDROM itself,
the original Win98 CDROM.

I had thought of this.
Been into BIOS and the virus scan is switched off, if I switch it on would
it say if the problem is down to a virus?
Click to expand...

No, that's just protection for the BIOS. Many anti-virus softwares will
allow making boot disks with a minimal DOS version of the scanning engine
and the virus definition files so a system can be scanned from DOS.

Would switching on SMART indicate a problem with the HDD
Click to expand...

???

I don't understand the question. If SMART is enabled and the system
displays a warning about the drive, then the drive itself has determined
that there's "some" kind of problem. The drive does this anyway, the
setting in the bios is only whether or not the motherboard checks the
HDD's state or reports it.

Forget about smart unless you saw a warning... Run the HDD manufacturer's
diagnostic utilities.
I can't, I can't access the CD drive
Click to expand...

You don't seem to be trying the suggestions I already made in the last
post. There is definitely a boot order setting in your bios unless it's a
heavily modified OEM motherboard, and even then there's usually a setting
to change the boot device order. Change it to boot from the floppy, and
use a Win98 Startup floppy. When it boots from the Win98 floppy, if you
then get an error message, write down exactly what it says.
 
I have tried to boot it from the floppy, it seems to ignores it, hence me
then going to A drive to run the autoexec.
Click to expand...

You can't do that. The autoexec.bat file will include something like:
mscdex.exe /d:NAME_MENTIONED_IN_CONFIG_SYS_FILE
since you aren't booting off the disk, the config.sys file isn't being read
and the DOS CDROM driver is not being loaded from the disk (MSCDEX is not
the CDROM driver)
That is where it then says the generic driver won't work.
Click to expand...

You are paraphrasing the message.
 
Hi,

I need some advice about a computer that has problems.
The computer isn't mine, I am trying to fix it for them.

The issue is that the computer won't start Win98 as a file is missing or
corrupt, it boots to MSDOS.
I tried copying the file from another machine but I had an idea it wouldn't
work.
The result was I needed to reinstall Win 98.

The person didn't have a boot disk, so I made one from another computer.
When I start the machine with the boot disk in the computer doesn't seem to
look at the A: drive or the D: Drive but tries to boot from C:

Probably an issue with the BIOS.

So I manually changed to A: drive and ran the Autoexec.
This worked however I can't get CD support in, hence I can't install Win98,
it says the driver is for a generic CD and mine needs another driver, this
is a Liteon drive.

So do I get a Liteon driver?
Or is there some other way of getting the CD drive to work in MSDOS?
If I get the driver how would I incorporate it onto the boot disk?

Any help would be good.

Thanx.
Click to expand...

There are drivers called from the config.sys of the floppy drive when it
boots. One of those is required for the CD to operate. When you ran the
autoexec.bat from the floppy, you didn't get the config.sys drivers. All
you got was the mscdex.exe program, which is the higher level part of DOS
cdrom support. Without the drivers called in the config.sys, the cd won't
work.

You need to get your machine to boot from either floppy or CDROM. You will
have to change boot sequence in the BIOS setup.

JT
 
Chris S said:
Hi,

I need some advice about a computer that has problems.
The computer isn't mine, I am trying to fix it for them.

The issue is that the computer won't start Win98 as a file is missing or
corrupt, it boots to MSDOS.
I tried copying the file from another machine but I had an idea it wouldn't
work.
The result was I needed to reinstall Win 98.

The person didn't have a boot disk, so I made one from another computer.
When I start the machine with the boot disk in the computer doesn't seem to
look at the A: drive or the D: Drive but tries to boot from C:

Probably an issue with the BIOS.

So I manually changed to A: drive and ran the Autoexec.
This worked however I can't get CD support in, hence I can't install Win98,
it says the driver is for a generic CD and mine needs another driver, this
is a Liteon drive.

So do I get a Liteon driver?
Or is there some other way of getting the CD drive to work in MSDOS?
If I get the driver how would I incorporate it onto the boot disk?

Any help would be good.

Thanx.
Click to expand...
http://www.liteonamericas.com/us/download_driver.htm
http://www.liteonit.com/ODD/Zip/v414.zip

Make sure that mscdex.exe and cdrom.sys are on your boot disk; and then edit
your autoexec.bat and config.sys files to include the following lines:-

Autoexec.bat:-
MSCDEX.EXE /D:MSCD000 /V /M:12 /L:E

Config.sys:-
DEVICE=CDROM.SYS /D:MSCD000 /DMA
LASTDRIVE=Z

Note: /L:E and /DMA are not necessary; I use them to assign a specific cdrom
drive letter, and to give my liteon dma support.
 
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