Protected mode wont start

[Guest]

I have a hard disk problem on a windows 98 machine. It always boots into safe mode ok, and device manager says all is well. It also boots fine if I turn on force compatibility mode drive access, but if I dont it hangs just before it launches into the windows GUI. Its as though it stalls before going into protected mode.
But heres the catch...
If I kick my PC (quite hard) it will then happily whirr away and boot normally at that point.
This is no long term solution so I ask... WTF?
Is this a hardwrae fault? a virus? a config issue? Space Aliens?
Hopefully I can rule out anything too stupid (I'm an MCSE). anyone seen this before? PLS HELP!

 

[camieabz]

How the hell do you do your trouble shooting?????

Kick it fairly hard!!!

Try kicking it less, and your system may last longer.


I usually uncheck DMA on any or all HDDs & CD drives if I get those sort of problems. This can be one possibility. What did you do to make it start booting in this way?

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