wierd ME startup problem

[MIXPIX]

A person called me asking me to help them fix their computer....i go thinking it will be a cake walk but i was mistaken.

When you turn the power on it goes through the normal bios startup then it goes into the dos startup stuff and it stops and says this...

-------------------------------------------------------------
Searching for Boot Record from IDE-0..ok
Starting Windows Millennium Emergency Boot...

Type the name of the Command Interpreter (e.g., C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND.COM)
-------------------------------------------------------------

No matter what i type in it always says "Type the name of the Command Interpreter (e.g., C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND.COM)" even when i type the one it tells me to!

there ME startup disk doesnt work...i put it in my machine and its not even formatted...well thats what XP says...

Does anyone know how to fix this?

Thanks alot

Matt

 

[Toejam31]

Possible solutions:

<A HREF="http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;EN-US;q268980&" target="_new">Error Message When You Upgrade to Windows Me: "The Following File Is Missing or Corrupt"</A>

<A HREF="http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch000012.htm" target="_new">Receiving error "Missing command interpreter"</A>

<A HREF="http://www.drd.dyndns.org/index2.html" target="_new">Boot Disks</A>.

You could just try reinstalling the operating system as an overwrite.

Toejam31

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<font color=purple>"Some push the envelope. Some just lick it. And some can't find the flap."</font color=purple>

 

[MIXPIX]

Hey,

Thanks for the information

I got a WinME boot disk....it starts that up fine...then i used to fdisk and formatted the master boot record....i restarted and that didnt do a thing and i tried some of the others things onthe boot disk to....i just ran command.com and it told me to restart after it did some stuff....

what else could it be?

should i throw my hard drive in there to see if it starts up?

 

[Toejam31]

Before you start swapping around hard drives, I'd think the best way to fix the problem would be to blow away the partitions on the disk, recreate them, format them, and then try to reinstall WinME.

You can remove the partitions with a disk utility from the hard drive manufacturer.. which will let you low level format or erase the disk. This kind of utility will also allow you to run tests on the hard drive in case of something like bad sectors. The low level formatting will mark any bad sectors, so data can't be written to these areas again.

If the Master Boot Record happens to contain a virus, low level formatting will remove it.

Then I'd use a regular Win98SE boot disk with the FDISK utility to recreate the partition(s). Format normally with the boot disk, and then try to reinstall WinME.

If this doesn't work, there may be other, more serious issues, such as with the IDE controller, or the hard drive itself.

The disk utility should give you an indication if the hard drive is the source of the problem.

If after this, you still can't boot into Windows, then swap out the hard drive, and see if the system can boot. If not, the mainboard may need repaired or replaced.

Toejam31


<font color=red>First Rig:</font color=red> <A HREF="http://www.anandtech.com/mysystemrig.html?rigid=17935" target="_new"><font color=green>Toejam31's Devastating Dalek Destroyer</font color=green></A>
<font color=red>Second Rig:</font color=red> <A HREF="http://www.anandtech.com/mysystemrig.html?rigid=15942" target="_new"><font color=green>Toey's Dynamite DDR Duron</font color=green></A>
__________________________________________________________

<font color=purple>"Some push the envelope. Some just lick it. And some can't find the flap."</font color=purple>

 

[MIXPIX]

Thanks,

Ill get the WinME cd off of them today and see what i can do

Thanks for all the help

Matt