[wes74]

i had a compaq with windows ME running on it, anyways one day it wouldn't start it would come to a black screen with the letters compaq on it and just spin, so i tried a windows me bootable floppy and that didn't work, tried recovery cd , nothin, ordered quick restore cd's and still nothing worked. so i put the hd in my new comp and reformatted it and then stuck it back in the old comp, i bought xp and put it in the cd-rom, but the cd wouldn't load same screen appeared. i tied to get to Bios with all the f keys but couldn't. then downloaded the 6 floppy bootable floppies ofr xp and them still didn't work, i would install xp to the old hard dirve on my new comp , but u have to disconnect the cd-roms to hook-up the hd. my next step is to try to copy the image but i cna't find a good free download of an imaging tool, i heard maxblast plus II is good but i can't find a download site.

any help on how to load an os on my old comp or any good free disk imagers would be greatly appreciated

[TheMajor]

Try booting without HD's.
Clear BIOS.

[comrad]

did you try getting into the bios with "del"

[beedubaya]

Clear CMOS, using the CMOS battery jumper. It should fix it.

[wes74]

yes i tried hitting delete,

Major- clear bios will it automatically bring up bios without the hard dirve and i just delete it all or wat??

Beebudya- how do i get to CMOS and where do i find CMOS battery jumper


p.s. someone at another forum said u couldn't format a hard drive in one comp and use it in another is this true


btw- when the comp is on and i am pressing buttons like caps lock and number lock the appropriate lights don't come on is this a bad thing or do they only come on when the system is booted

[beedubaya]

It should be to the left of your CMOS battery, a little blue jumper. Just remove it for 5 minutes or so and put it back in. You will have to redefine all your CMOS settings, but it should work.

[TheMajor]

Maybe your keyboard is broken.
You CAN format a HD in different comps and use them in another comp.

[wes74]

if none of this works i will prob just buy an image maker

u know a lot about these right,
anyways aren't there some where u need bootable floppies or somesort of bootable media,
which ones are the easiest to use and don't need any bootable material

is norton ghost the best since it is basically like 2 in 1 since it has drive image and ghost in it


Thanx for all the help greatly appreciated
wes

[TheMajor]

I wouldn't go for Ghost. I would go for PowerQuest's software, use Drive Image 2002, Drive Image 7 or V2i Protector 2.0.
Powerquests products are faster and have a higher compression. Even thoug the latest Ghost has V2i technoloy I would still not get it. I just don't trust Symantec and hate them for buying Powerquest.

My 0.02

Oh, and what do u mean by "didn't work". What happend when putting in the discs/floppy?

[wes74]

with drive image 7 u don't need any floppies of any sort right(only ask this cuz my sis is goin back to college and takin the ocmp with the floppy drive and this one doesn't have one so if u need them im screwed)

anyways i made the floppies on a dell and i put the first one in and started it up and it went to the black screen with a red compaq on it
also was meaning to ask this earlier but forgot when i made the floppies i checked the box that said make ms-dos startup disc, cuz i was making a startup disc, should i have left that box unchecked or wat

major- thanx for havin ur sig as that opera thing i downloaded the free version and its awesome, its way faster than IE, only thing that sux is the ads but i cna live with that

p.s. i know this is way way off subject, but i have a game that was made in 1994(Nascar Racing I from Papyrus) anyways i was wonderin if games made before windows 95 would run in windows 95 or if i should get windows 3.0