Help with Old Win95 Startup

Hello all

I need a Win95 expert for some help with a boot problem, please! I have an old Gateway PC with Windows 95 OS, a parsed 12GB harddrive (C,D,E,F), pentium IV processer, and about 256MB RAM. This is a second PC we use for word processing, but it has a lot of old and valuble data on it. It had not been hooked up to the internet for a few years - we hooked it to a cable modem, but a few years ago got a newer PC so switched the cable modem to it. I got a Belkin G wireless router recently, and last night got a networking ethernet cable, hooked it up, and it worked great (still had the original PCI card) with just the ethernet connection into the router.

I uninstalled McAffee and Norton AVs (old setups), and downloaded and installed AVG antivirus, ran a scan and got rid of a few old viruses. I also downloaded and installed Framxpro to optimize my limited RAM. The machine seemed to work fine, although slow due to limited RAM. Particularly since I also downloaded and ran Mozilla Firefox, but Framxpro seemed to help. I uninstalled as many old programs as I could, and used a registry clean software (don't recall the name) to delete out old programs that either weren't on the Control Panel Add/Remove list, or that couldn't be deleted.

I shut the machine off last night for the first time after making all these changes, and today, when I started the machine, it went through the boot routine, but when it got to end of the Autoexec.bat (?), the last entry was C:\WIN95\WININIT.EXE - then some blank rows, and a series of alphabet letters and strange symbols, then a message stating "press any key to continue". All still in the black "DOS" background. When I hit any key, the screen goes black and a message "it is now safe to turn off your machine" comes up. I tried doing a safe boot and other options under alternate boots, but the result is the same.

I pulled out a boot disk I created in 1999 and tried that, but it didn't work either - went through the DOS checks and then ended with the A:/ command line.

I then tried the original Win95 system CD and the 3.5" System disk, putting both in the machine and starting it. I get options on the screen for either installing DOS or CD ROM drives. I didn't opt for the DOS installation on the hard drive, because it noted it would reformat the hard drive if needed. I have a lot of data on this machine I'd like to keep, so didn't want to take a chance with this. Plus since it is a parsed hard drive, I didn't know how that might react. I tried the CD ROM drives install option, but that didn't do anything - it noted that a file (M______ ?) related to the CD ROM was already present and wanted to know if I wanted to overwrite it with a newer version. I didn't say yes.

I don't think that I inadvertently deleted anything critical from the registry
that could prevent a normal or safe boot up, but at this point I'm not sure.

Any ideas on what I can try to troubleshoot this, and try to get it to boot up?

Thanks,

Geolbob (Bob)

 

I'm assuming this is a CD version of 95 and not floppy?

Not too many 95 users left, and my memory like others is extremely sketchy.

Have you tried reinstalling Windows over itself in whatever partition it's in? (You shouldn't lose any files or settings)

Also, if you change drives in DOS and go to c: (or whatever the relevant partition is), then enter dir what comes up if anything?

Any error messages or warnings that might help someone diagnose this, and can you start in Safe Mode?

 

Hi Insomniac

Sorry for the delay in responding - was away 3 days for National Guard duty.

I cannot boot in Safe mode - I get the same result. I tried booting in the other options after hitting F8 during startup: Normal, Logged (\bootlog.txt), Safe, Step-by-step. All give the same result as described. I can boot to the DOS prompt option, so can view files on the system and access disks I insert in the PC. I don't remember any DOS command, however - been too long. There is an option of "Previous everison of MS-DOS", but I haven't tried that since I'm not sure what it might do.

Yes, all partitioned hard drives appear to still contain all the data. C:\ has 30 directories and 81 files, so everything looks like it's there.

No warnings or error messages appear - just the DOS screen line entries I noted, with the last executable being:

C;\WIN95\WININIT.EXE

And a couple of blank rows below that are the alphabet starting at "e", with the letters spaced apart, then unrecognizable symbols, then the phrase "press any key to continue....." If you press any key, or if you simply wait, the screen changes with the message "It is now safe to turn off your computer". Which is the normal shutdown message after exiting Windows for shutdown.

I do have the Win95 CD, but not sure what to select to re-intall WIN95. The CD contains several directories (including WIN95), and the following separate files:

AUTORUN.INF
SETUP.EXE

There is a README.TXT file that I opened at on my other PC - it is attached; it only gives these options (1) If you haven't installed WIN95, (2) list of other "readme" files, (3), How to read other "readme" files, and (4) uninstalling WIN95. So not sure which command to give to reinstall WIN95.

I also have a couple of Startup floppies I made years ago. They contain the following files:

DRVSPACE.BIN SCANDISK.EXE GETREPLY.EXE
COMMAND.COM SCANDISK.INI HIMEM.SYS
FORMAT.COM DEBUG.EXE
SYS.EXE CHKDSK.EXE
FDISK.EXE UNINSTAL.EXE
ATTRIB.EXE CONFIGSYS.EXE
EDIT.COM AUTOEXEC.BAT
REGEDIT.EXE BO0TSCAN.EXE

Some of these might be useful to try executing, but not sure what to try.

Hoping someone can give me some guidance on what other information to look up in files on the PC (which I can access through DOS prompt), or what if any of the above executables to try.

Any assistance and guidance is greatly appreciated!

Thanks,

Bob

 

I would try reinstalling Windows over itself.

Setup.exe should begin the process.

If not, just format and start again.