Very strange...

I had Red Hat Linux on my computer, but due to circumstances beyond my control, I had to remove it completely and put Windows ME back on over it. So I put in my HP Pavilion Recovery CD's, and a blue screen pops up telling me that there is nothing on my hard drive and to use Fdisk to format it. I little frusturating, but I do so.

Afterwards, the screen says to restart the computer. I do that, and now the format program seems to be running normally. I chose the "Format and Recover" option I was offered. I waited for it to do its thing and it tells me that recovery is complete and to click to reboot the computer. I did so, and it seemed to boot up normally, but right after the HP Pavilion screen appeared, I got a black screen with one grey word in the upperleft of the screen: GRUB. I couldn't type ANYTHING at this screen, and was forced to hold the power button for 6 seconds to turn it off.

Saddened, I put the first recovery CD in to start the process over again, hoping it would work this time. Instead of the "Format & Recover" option, though, I clicked Advanced Options to open the DOS Shell. From there, I ran an unconditional format ( FORMAT/U/V C: ), and, once finished with that, went back to the menu picked the "Recover" option (Just below the "Format and Recover" one). The result? The same; it gave me the GRUB screen again when I turned on the computer.

Now feeling downright depressed, I used a Windows ME boot floppy I had made previously. I chose the "Run without CD-ROM support" option, and it took a while, then said that COMMAND.COM was either missing or corrupt. I tried the other options, and they said the same thing. I have no idea what to do from here. Please help me.

 

Can I assume you have bootdisk? Is so boot off it and at the A: type FDISK/MBR. then enter


That should do the trick. It will remove references to Grub, ( Linux bootloader).





It'd be wise then to start from scratch.

 

Evidently GRUB is a bootloader tool. This article tells you about it. Looks like it may be a left over from Redhat. It might be trying to control your loading process and nullifying it. If that's the case then you'll have to nuke it as gill suggested, before you can install anything.

 

Grub is indeed a Linux bootloader, be aware that a format, low level or otherwise will have no effect on the contents of the M(aster) B(oot ) R(ecord). When Grub, or LILO is installed it overwrites the Windows bootloader.

Step 1. Boot off floppy, run FDISK/MBR
Step 2. Fdisk and partition as usual
Step 3. Format
Done.

If you have any problems let me know