[Nico]

My PC messes up again
I had a weird pb, a DOS window kept opening at the start of windows ( 98SE ), after a couple seconds, it tells me moo.reg is not a valit registre file, it closes and opens, keeping doing that. As a test, I rename regedit.exe to regedit.tmp. So the dos window just opens and closes, but w/o any messages. after some feedling around, I decide to reinstal windows over my old one, which did nothng save for messing up my mouse. after some more tests, I find out the damn dos windows is the command.com file in the windows folder. once again, I rename it to .tmp. The dos windows won't appear anymore, but I get a explorer32 ( I think, don't remember for sure ) error, and that's all.  That settled, I decide ( big mistake ), to reinstal my mouse software ( a microsoft explorer2 mouse... ). it tells me it will need to close AOL, Outlook and Kazaa coz it needs to modify some of their files ( wtf is what I think, anyway, I close the damn progs ). yeppee, I install the mouse, reboot, try the mouse, it works fine again. I launch AOL: "can't find propper IP adress" or something.
nervous breakdown
I decide, ultimately, to uninstal completly Win98 and reinstal it. I launch the unsinstal prog. scandisk launches... scan disk tells me an error occured and windows can't be unisntalles.
nervous meltdown

So there it is. I can't reformat my HD, I have too much stuff on it, can't backup everything, I would need to many CD. I'm not sure if rebooting in dos mode and deleting the windows folder then reinstalling windows would work.
I'm thinking of buying a big ass 80Gb HD to do my backups and formating my main HD. Pb is every time I want to install a new HD, I have pbs and can't sort it out w/o my brother. And now I'm 300 kms away from him...

So... what would you do?

[Pera]

Originally posted by venom2506
I'm not sure if rebooting in dos mode and deleting the windows folder then reinstalling windows would work.

If it's not a hardware problem, this will fix it 99% surely.

[wEvil]

I'd run an anti-virus scan, then copy everything over to a different machines' drive with an antiviral screen running, then reformat the old drive.

Sounds like something nassty at any rate?

Failing that, get win2k.

[IceFire]

Reinstalling Windows over Windows is simply the worst thing you could have done.  I've found that never to work in personal experience and with anyone that comes into the store that I work at.

Backup your data because you now need to reformat or you will be pulling out your hairs for the next while.

[Nico]

I already ran an antivirus, and have no other PC for backup...
reinstalling windows over an old one worked last time I had pbs with AOL
well, I can't backup, so I'll go for the delete windows folder way.

[Darkage]

Nasty prob you have dude, as others have said reformat your HDD...

And try to get a hold of win2k...Much more stable and better to work whit then win98se...And freespace and other games run fine on it.

I have a 40gb HDD and devided into 2 partitions.. one 10gb for my C:\ where only the OS is on. And the second is my 30GB D:\ drive for my games and other data. That way you never loose your stuff...

[Nico]

I'll probably go and buy a 80Gb HD after college... jsut hope I'll be able to install it.

[Styxx]

Just do it like this, if you're getting a new HD:
1. Get a new HD
2. Remove your old HD from the comp
3. Install the new HD (few easy steps, specially if it's pre-formatted)
4. Install windows on the new HD
5. See if everything works fine
6. Plug the other HD on the machine, and copy the files over
7. Done

If not, you can try telling us what is the scandisk error you get, it may be a physical error on the disk surface, and this kind of stuff is not really recoverable...

[Stealth]

Whatever you do, don't just 'delete the Windows folder and reinstall' or reinstall over Windows... like ICE-FIRE said, that is the worst thing you can do

reboot in dos, and do the /s format, then reinstall... whatever problems you had, a corrupt OS or whatever, that will help!

That happened to me about 3 years ago or maybe a bit less, but the computer was still under warranty (this was my old one) so I just took it to the computer store, and they fixed it overnight (backuped the HD, formatted, reinstalled)


Let us know what happens though
~Stealth~

[Stealth]

yeah, if you're getting any scandisk errors, post them here...

also, try to run a scandisk (even if you have to run it through dos)
see if it brings up any 'bad sectors' on the HD, and if it does, backup as much as you can and get a new HD

[Nico]

k.
for scandisk, it doesn't tell me anything specific, just that it cannot go through, period. stupid thing. Anyway, I don't worry, I know the disk is fine, it's just windows which messed up ( I run many other scandisks for the last few days, and even a couple today, only the one for uninstaling windows messes up ).

edit: the new HD woul not be to replace the one where windows curently is ( a 30 Gb disk ) but my old D: ( 2 Gb ).

[Eternal One]

Just to get this straight, the whole thing started with the dos box? Did you check if it was just some carbage that whatever program could've inputted into your startup list? With msconfig or similar.

[Nico]

Originally posted by Eternal One
Just to get this straight, the whole thing started with the dos box? Did you check if it was just some carbage that whatever program could've inputted into your startup list? With msconfig or similar.

well, that's something I dunno how to do, i asked around, and nobody could reply. but yeah, it's most likely a messy install of something ( dunno what tho ). Anyway, as AOL is messed up too now...

[Eternal One]

Originally posted by Stealth
Whatever you do, don't just 'delete the Windows folder and reinstall' or reinstall over Windows... like ICE-FIRE said, that is the worst thing you can do...

Deleting just the Windows folder completely and installing again works just fine. I've done that dozens of times on my own comp and on friends.

What you should never try is installing Windows into a dir in which Windows already resides, or any of the repair-options available in Windows itself.

[CP5670]

It sounds like your registry got hosed (which is not all that rare actually, since the whole system is so messy), so I would also recommend that youn backup your files, format your hard drive and do a clean install of Windows.

[Nico]

yeah, to me it's the registry hack who is cthumblemred ( new word by me ). bah, I'll just delete windows and reinstal it, it'll have to do until this weekend, then I can buy a HD saturday.
And people might wonder why i don't do their stuff

[killadonuts]

Originally posted by IceFire
Reinstalling Windows over Windows is simply the worst thing you could have done.  I've found that never to work in personal experience and with anyone that comes into the store that I work at.

Backup your data because you now need to reformat or you will be pulling out your hairs for the next while.

Gee that's wierd.
When I used Windows 98 and Me reinstalling fixed most problems most of the time
However in the case of a registry problem, you would have to backup and reformat.

[Nico]

well, yeah, no other choice now, basically, until I get a new HD for backup, my PC is 100% out of order. mmh. no, I can still write txt files, I can still write "edit ****.txt".
DOS: best - OS - ever. Never crashes ( if you have good mem settings that is... )
bah, I should get win2k the weekend next week.

[SlipStream]

Backup your data because you now need to reformat or you will be pulling out your hairs for the next while.

When my comp rann into problems And there was no way to fix it. I had to reformat it.

Then my dad waks in. Told him what happened. So he took a look at it and told me that there was oxydation (or Oxidation) however youy spell that. Unfortunately I didn;t have any files to back up at the time.
Every computer has its own problems different from others.
Mabe you had so much information. you can reinstall win se and have it save the data or you can get rid of if you want.

[Kitsune]

If you can get windows to run, go to the add/remove programs and go down the list of stuff you've put in.. Take out the unneeded stuff.  (Everything except your antivirus and maybe some other stuff.)

Restore what you did to msconfig and the other programs that you changed.

Open msconfig and go to the startup tab and go down the list, unclicking anything that you don't know.  (leave stuff like systray, explorer, antivirii...)

Reboot.

See what happens.

If not, move the tab on your boot floppy to read only, insert.  Open windows with cd support, delete c:\windows

And in the future, always always keep your large HD's partitioned so you don't lose an entire useful part by accident.