Floppy drive problem

[Yachtlady]

Thanks to everyone who responded to my question. I found out that the floppy drive is made backwards so that if you follow the directions no 1 pin is on the wrong side.
Now I am getting the screen that says "Boot
disk failure, insert system disk and press
enter". I put in the floppy that came with Windows 98 full version for new machines and I get the same message. What is a system disk if it is not the boot disk with DOS and FDISK on it that came with Windows 98?

[Susan]

Have you set your boot sequence in the BIOS to A,C,CDROM? It's under BIOS Features Setup.

[Yachtlady]

Thanks for responding. Yes the drive sequence is A,C, SCSI. Is the floppy that came with Win 98 the one the machine is looking for?

[BBA]

Ummm...hate to say it but, I have hooked up floppy drives backwards before and had a disk in them when I turned on the machine...

It kills the floppy disk! You might want to find another boot disk.

[Yachtlady]

Are you saying that by following the directions for installing the floppy drive and inserting the Win 98 disc, I have ruined it?

[Dash]

Hes saying thats a possibility. I have never ran into a Floppy made wrong, more than likely you accidently had it switched on the motherboard side, or the cable was just plain freaked, hehe. Anyway, just try a couple different disks with it

[Yachtlady]

The Best Buy tech looked at the floppy drive and said it was backwards and that pin no 1 was on the wrong side so the directions to put the red line nearest the power supply were wrong. The connection to the motherboard is correct according the the manual that came with it.

[kongkong]

I have seen so many posts about floppy drive problems over all the net, no real solutions.

I have problems with mine too. It works sometimes, sometimes not. I dont' think that has anything to do with the connection cable, at least not in my case. I read somewhere that some floppy controllers have some flaws, and it seems that nobody is eager to solve that.

FYI, Toshiba sued for billions coz of data loss caused by bad floppy controllers.

I have given up trying to solve this problem, whenever I am planning to reinstall O/S, just copy neccessary driver files onto harddrive or zip disks or burn it onto CDR. Not something too exicting, but what else can i do? http://www.sysopt.com/forum/frown.gif

[Yachtlady]

I think the answer that the floppy is damaged now is probably the right answer because the message I get is "Boot Disc Failure". I will have someone look at it and I have contacted
Digital Research about the problem. I hope I don't have to buy another Win 98 package again. Thanks to everyone for your posts.

[kongkong]

Wait!

Sorry i didn't read you original post careful, thuoght you were re-installing something.

If the floppy disk doesn't work, why dont' you just boot from CDROM? It is much easier than waiting for some helpless help desk ppl...

Anyway, the floppy drive is almost useless nowadays.

[Yachtlady]

Does the CD that came with Win 98 have all the files I need to get this machine going?
Do I just change the boot sequence to read
CDROM? How risky is this? Let me remind you that I am just a novice. Thanks.

[Dave_H]

Try changing the boot sequence to
CD-rom/C drive and start your system with the win 98 disk in the drive. It's not risky at all, and yes, It has f-disc and format on it also. Note that some motherboards don't support this. If it doesent work, you can download a boot disk or make one off another windows 98 computer.
Dave

[smokin1]

Is the twist in the floppy cable just before the connection to the floppy?

[Yachtlady]

Yes, the it is plugged in at the end with the twist. I will try to boot from the CD tomorrow. Thanks, I'll read further messages in the morning.

[Dave_H]

Like I said, if your motherboard won't support a boot from the CD-Rom drive, here is where you can download a win 98 boot disc.http://www.mcecomputers.com/support/miscftp.html
This site came from http://www.bootdisk.com/
You could also make one from another win 98
computer under controll panel/add and remove programs/start-up disc.
Keep this site handy if you need any updated drivers for anything. http://www.windrivers.com/
Go to the top left where it says advanced search to find current drivers.
Good luck http://www.sysopt.com/forum/smile.gif
Dave
Edit- sorry, I couldn't get that first link to post. Go to the bootdisc.com link then scroll down to where it says "Windows 95 and Windows 98 boot disk by media". Then find the windows 98 set-up bootdisc.



[This message has been edited by Dave_H (edited 01-15-2000).]