98 machine won't boot

Alright...someone I know's running Win 98....they were apparently installing some "Go Back" software, which wouldn't fully install b/c there was no partition for it to store its copies of the compy's settings. So, he attempted to create a partition (dunno if he actually managed to do this correctly). Now, Win will not boot. It makes it as far as the blue screen that says " Windows 98"....but it kinda gets stuck there and stays on that screen indefinately. It refuses to boot in safe mode, using the boot-up disk doesn't help, and attempting to re-install 98 doesn't work. Around 25% of the way through it says that the file impeee.exe (or something like that) is unavailable (or perhaps in use) and then refuses to proceed with the installation. He would rather not format the HDD....so....what should I do? Thnx, in advance, for you help....

 

This can be either:

a) The Patitions weren't set correctly or added whilst OS was installed or

b) Windows 98 Cd is Stuffed

Let me know how he did his patitioning

 

If the friend just wants to reinstall Win98 and not worry about losing any data on the hd boot the machine with a 98 boot disk and check the partitions using fdisk. If only one partition exists format it and then reinstall Win98. You should not get the installation error.

 

Just remembered something about GoBack software, I don't think it's partition table is readable from DOS boot disk.
If this is the problem then I do know that Adrynalyne knows how to fix this. Hopefully he will see this post and give you a hand
In the meantime I will try and find his post for a fix and give you the link.

 

OK...as it turns out the partition was created after the OS had already been installed. Why is this necessarily a problem? And what can I do about it (aside from formatting and re-installing)? Btw, when running scandisk, it says that I may need "to load the emm386.exe driver to load your other device drivers into Upper Memory Blocks using DEVICEHIGH= statements". WFT?!?!

 

*bump* I need help here, people.

 

EMM386 is probably one for the old lags. It goes back to DOS 5 and is a base memory manager. All computers have a base memory of 640k and this was all we had to work with. Prior to that (and I still have one) computers had a base memory of 512k yes K not M. I can remember paying £200·00 for 8mb of EDO (Extended Data Output) ram. You had to edit the Config.SYS and the DEVICEHIGH statement was placed at start. I am lead to believe that this statement went by the wayside with W98 as there is little or no DOS support. Quite often (in the bad old days of W95) a program would state that you didn't have enough memory to run it, this was misleading as it did not require EXTENDED memory, the problem was Base memory and running MEMMAKER (Part of windows) would usually sort this out. Hope this info helps.

 

Well if 'Go Back' (never used this prog though I have 98se with a similar prog called 'Second Chance') has create some sort of additional partition in your opinion, then you should confirm this.

Boot to dos and to go fdisk to see what partitions exist on your HDD and which one is set to active.

Your o/s is trying to boot but somehow that last step to get to the desktop is problematic.

Have you tried booting to safemode btw......