Hard Drive Wizard/Doctor needed!
Discussion
My mate's Notebook (Tiny A430 PIII) has gone horribly wrong and won't load Windows98. It just comes up with 'user.exe not found' and then switches itself off. If any of you can get the data off the hard drive and onto a CD or three, she'd really appreciate it - with money and everything!
PS. DOS commands work fine - it's just loading windws that doesn't work - and it can't see any drive past C:
PS. DOS commands work fine - it's just loading windws that doesn't work - and it can't see any drive past C:
plotloss said:
Does the laptop drive have a standard IDE interface?
If so, just whip the drive out of the laptop and stick it in another machine.
Nope the hardrive wont have a standard IDE interface. Notebooks use a smaller IDE interface (not to sure in the technical term) which mean's you cant plug it into a normal IDE cable. Saying that you can buy a adapter so you can plug the notebook drive into a normal IDE interface.
You could reinstall 98, that may fix the prob with out having to format the drive (hmm not used 98 in years so a bit rusty).
The recovery disk she has warns that it will erase all data, and I can't get to the hard drive.
It goes through the startup procedure and seems to want to run in safe mode, then a "cannot find a device... vredir.vxd" comes up twice followed by that "cannot find user.exe" message and night night.
Seriously, anyone in the central london area who can fix this, there's cash in it as well as the grateful thanks of a very pregnant girl who happens to have very good connections to the dunhill golf tournament (if you like that sort of thing!).
It goes through the startup procedure and seems to want to run in safe mode, then a "cannot find a device... vredir.vxd" comes up twice followed by that "cannot find user.exe" message and night night.
Seriously, anyone in the central london area who can fix this, there's cash in it as well as the grateful thanks of a very pregnant girl who happens to have very good connections to the dunhill golf tournament (if you like that sort of thing!).
Well its a known fault having just had a pick around.
Vredir.vxd is the virtual network device redirector so handles such things as friendly names. There was a known bug in 98 where the op sys decided to hose itself. In the first instance I would try installing windows on top of itself from a clean 98 disc (I can sort you out with one if you want) and see what happens.
Vredir.vxd is the virtual network device redirector so handles such things as friendly names. There was a known bug in 98 where the op sys decided to hose itself. In the first instance I would try installing windows on top of itself from a clean 98 disc (I can sort you out with one if you want) and see what happens.
If theres at least a gig or so free on the HDD you could use partition magic to reduce the size of the existing partition, convert it into a logical partition, create a new primary partition in the space you've just freed up, then install Win98 into that.
The logical parition would than appear as a new drive (D: or whatever) when you boot up Windows, and you can copy stuff off at your leisure.
The logical parition would than appear as a new drive (D: or whatever) when you boot up Windows, and you can copy stuff off at your leisure.
Easiest option mentioned is to buy the IDE conversion cable, they are about a fiver. Plug the hard drive and adapter cable into the secondary IDE socket on the motherboard, usually the CDrom will be in this one. Boot up the PC and the laptop hard drive should appear as another drive in explorer, then copy the data off it. If you feel unsure and you don't mind being without it for a few days, then you can post it to me and I'll get it all off onto a CD for you.
Andy
Andy
If you can get into DOS - you could do the following:
Rename the windows directory to something else.
Use a M$ Windows 98 cd (NOT a recovery cd) run setup and install windows to c:windows.
This will allow you to get at and copy off her data - what you won't have is all her other s/w available. You could even try copying the needed files from your new windows dir to the old , rename accordingly and try to booting.
If still stuck - give me a shout - I've got adaptor etc and could burn data to cd(s) for you. (Not too far away)
Rename the windows directory to something else.
Use a M$ Windows 98 cd (NOT a recovery cd) run setup and install windows to c:windows.
This will allow you to get at and copy off her data - what you won't have is all her other s/w available. You could even try copying the needed files from your new windows dir to the old , rename accordingly and try to booting.
If still stuck - give me a shout - I've got adaptor etc and could burn data to cd(s) for you. (Not too far away)
Probably not understanding the problem properly.... If you can get into DOS then use the edit command to edit the config.sys and the autoexec.bat to add the devices you need to "see" the cd-rom drive - reboot and run winsetup from the cd-rom drive to install '98 over the original. Shouldn't need to delete anything then.
adding drivers for cdroms to config.sys and autoexec.bat
*This is necessary for using your CDROM with Dos .
These are called real-mode drivers and not needed for windows (indeed may cause bugs if present).
I am sure I've experienced similar problems before, I reinstalled windows and everything was fine.
(er....forgot to backup my work first , but thats a story for a different day).
It's not a major problem from the looks of things,
windows has got a bit muddled up thats all.
So re-install and everythings going to be fine.
I'm based in SW London, shame your not near my place
otherwise I could have helped out !
Regards,
Ramesh
*This is necessary for using your CDROM with Dos .
These are called real-mode drivers and not needed for windows (indeed may cause bugs if present).
I am sure I've experienced similar problems before, I reinstalled windows and everything was fine.
(er....forgot to backup my work first , but thats a story for a different day).
It's not a major problem from the looks of things,
windows has got a bit muddled up thats all.
So re-install and everythings going to be fine.
I'm based in SW London, shame your not near my place
otherwise I could have helped out !
Regards,
Ramesh
re-installing from a standard windows disk shouldn't affect you're data or any other win32 applications on your system. The recovery disk you mention probably just wipes the hard drive and copies a standard image to the drive. I wouldn't use this unless you want to lose all your files.
To recover your files do as said above plug the hard drive into another machine and copy them off onto the main hard drive in that machine.
Then run the recovery disk.
Unless you can get your hands on a standard windows98 disc (ver2 pref.) and just reinstall, should boot from the CD. If it's a later version and won't upgrade. boot from the CD into DOS change to the windows directory and delete win.com and it will.
To recover your files do as said above plug the hard drive into another machine and copy them off onto the main hard drive in that machine.
Then run the recovery disk.
Unless you can get your hands on a standard windows98 disc (ver2 pref.) and just reinstall, should boot from the CD. If it's a later version and won't upgrade. boot from the CD into DOS change to the windows directory and delete win.com and it will.
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