Email to Marilee Manson      

Recipe Categories: MarileeM's HOME PAGEABM ALaughADay Amish APPETIZERS BBQ BeautyProducts Beef BEVERAGES BREAD BREAKFAST BusyMomsQuickEasy CAKESandPIES CANDY Canning CASSEROLES ChiliRecipes Christmas CookingForACrowd CookingForTwo CookingTips CopyCatRecipes Crafts CROCKPOT DESSERTS DIABETIC DipsDressings Easter ETHNIC ExpressYourself FISHandSEAFOOD ForOurAnimalFriends FRUIT GermanDesserts GermanRecipes GiftsInAJar GroundBeef HolidayMainDish HolidayTreats HouseholdHints Italian KidPleaser Lamb LeftoverIdeas MEATS Mexican MicrowaveRecipes oldhomerecipe Oriental PASTA Pies PIZZA PoemsandStorys Pork Potpourri POULTRY RICE SALADandDRESSING SANDWICHES SAUCES SNACKS SOUPSandSTEWS TechnologyRelated Veal VEGETABLES

Oh, No! Windows Is Broken!




Source of Recipe


email from a tech friend
If you turn on your PC and Windows won't load, you may have any of several problems: a device conflict, a corrupted software driver, a trashed Registry--the list goes on and on. Here are some suggestions for identifying and fixing such problems.

Launch in Safe Mode
As soon as you see the "Starting Windows" message on your screen, press F5. This launches a bare-bones version of Windows that bypasses all the start-up files and loads the plain-vanilla VGA video driver.

If it loads successfully, go to the Device Manager (select Start, Settings, Control Panel, then double-click the System icon and click the Device Manager tab). Expand the entries in the device tree by double-clicking each one.

The expanded tree shows all installed devices by type. Yellow exclamation points appear next to any device that's experiencing a problem--inspect these first. Double-click a device's entry to open its Properties box, check the Device Status area for conflicts, then click the Resources tab and look at the Conflicting Device list. If it reports a conflict, launch the Hardware Conflict Troubleshooter (select Start, Help, then click the Contents tab and double-click the Troubleshooting icon to open the list of Troubleshooters). If there's no conflict, shut down your system and move on to the next tip.

Launch With Step-by-Step Confirmation
After you spot the "Starting Windows" message, press F8 to display the Windows start-up menu. The Step-by-Step Confirmation option walks you through start-up one step at a time. You can load or skip each device listed in the Registry and each action specified in your autoexec.bat and config.sys files. An error message will appear when any device or program fails to load properly.

When you start in step-by-step mode, you'll get the option of creating a start-up log file, called bootlog.txt, in the root directory. Do so. This document logs the successful--or unsuccessful--completion of each step. The data is arcane, but it can save you a lot of time if you end up calling technical support.

Run an Antivirus Program
Viruses are easy to acquire, especially if you download lots of material from the Internet. Fight back with a good antivirus program. Several are available for free download from PC World Online's FileWorld. (In some cases, these programs are time-limited demos.)

Be Prepared
The best offense, as we all know, is a good defense. For times when your PC just won't boot, you need to have a working boot disk stowed away. To make a boot disk in Windows 98, click Start, Settings, Control Panel, then double-click Add/Remove Programs, select the Startup Disk tab, and click Create Disk.

You can create a boot disk in Windows 95 using the same procedure, but the disk won't give you access to your CD-ROM drive, which is necessary if you have to reinstall Windows. Here's how to create a boot disk that does let you access the CD-ROM drive.

Insert a floppy disk, then open My Computer, right-click the A: icon, and select Format. Click the "Copy system files" check box, then click Start. When the formatting is done, click Close twice.

In Notepad, open the file Windows\Dosstart.bat, then save it as a:autoexec.bat (that a: is very important). Look for a line in the file containing mscdex.exe and delete everything up to it, so that the line begins with mscdex.exe. (You can remove all subsequent lines from the file, too.) Save the file.

Copy the file Windows\Command\Mscdex.exe onto your floppy.

Now comes the hard part: Back in Notepad, open config.sys on the C: drive and look for a device= command that might be for your CD-ROM drive. The letters cd anywhere in the command are a good sign, as is the name of your CD-ROM drive's manufacturer. If you can't find a likely suspect, see if there's another file on drive C: that begins with config--for instance, config.dos. When you've found a file with what you hope is the right line, save the file as a:config.sys. If the line begins with rem, delete that word; the line should begin with device=. The device= line refers to a file by its path and name--c:\nec_ide.sys, for example. Copy that file to drive A:. Then remove the path from the line in a:config.sys. For instance, if the line reads device=c:\nec_ide.sys /d:neccd0, trim it to device=nec_ide.sys d:/neccd0.

Now it's time to test what you've done. Stick a CD-ROM in your drive, put the floppy in drive A:, and reboot. When you get an A> prompt, type dir dor whatever letter your CD-ROM drive uses). If you get a file list, rejoice! Then remove the floppy, reboot, write-protect the floppy, and store it in a safe place. But if the dir command results in the error message "Invalid drive specification," go back and try again. This trick might help: Compare the commands in the floppy's config.sys and autoexec.bat files. Each should have a parameter that starts with /D:, followed by other letters. If that parameter isn't identical in both files, try changing one to match the other.