TSGL: Reformat Restore Can't Do It

[Don Penlington]

Dave wrote:

>Hi guys,
>
>I am unable to Reformat Restore.  >>


You might have a defective Restore disk. If it's as old as W98, I wouldn't 
be holding my breath.  The life of a CD is typically 5-8 years.

Try a manual reformat---insert an emergency Boot floppy and reformat your 
C-Drive. That will get rid of any nasties.  Then physically remove all 
external hardware such as printers, scanners, capture cards, etc.

Then try your restore disk again.  If W98 now runs OK, at least you've 
eliminated probs in HD or Restore Disk.

Add back your hardware if all else is now OK.

Better, reformat from a boot floppy, acquire a W98 disk (which you should 
purchase on Ebay for next to nothing), and load Windows from there.  Then 
you'll have a clean W98 install.

Manufacturers restore disks are seldom satisfactory, as they are usually 
full of OEM junk which may be incompatible with later software/hardware.

You can turn Scandisk off---it's only a nuisance.  I've forgotten most of 
W98 now, but the option is in one of the Boot files---Win.ini, 
System.ini,  Msdos.sys or Boot.ini or similar---have a look in C-Drive for 
those misc boot files which aren't in the Windows folder. You can edit them 
in Notepad. Don't forget to Save.

Don Penlington

 From the Beach at Surfers Paradise in sunny Queensland.
Computer tutorials, local scenery,  and other things at my website:
http://users.tpg.com.au/deepend/index1.html