Booting to DOS on WIn2k System

[Zirgon]

Hi,

I'm running Win2k Pro. It is the only OS on my system. I need to boot to pure DOS in order to update the BIOS on my motherboard. I made a bootdisk from another system that is running WIn98. I left the floppy in the drive and my system seems to ignore it. The floppy drive does seek the disk, but then Win2k takes over and booted up. I've also tried setting the CMOS to not look at any HDD partition. This time, the system respond with an error that there was not bootable disk.

Please post if you have any idea on how I can get my system to boot up into PURE DOS so I can update the BIOS on the motherboard. I've also tried a WinME bootdisk, but I got the same symptom. There is something weird going on as far as the NT partition.

Zir

 

[brewty]

are you sure you made that boot disk correctly? or does the floppy drive work? (plugged in right, etc). because you should be able to boot off a win9x boot disk regardless of what operating system you have installed...

 

[Doh!]

If you have a working bootable disk (i.e., win9x) and have set the drive path to start at <A:> in CMOS setup, you should not have any problems (and the A drive works). Check the bootable disk in another computer and check the CMOS setup.

 

[riceboi5]

Check your boot sequence in bios. Make sure it's A,C,cd or zip
Also verify that the boot disk actually works on the other machine.

 

[Zirgon]

Hey,

I was finally able to boot up in DOS via the bootdisk. I discovered there must be a partition on the system that is either fat or fat32. All partitions on my system were NTFS, so I had to put in a fat formated HDD. The bootdisk took over from there. Thanks everyone.

Zir

 

[Panther]

So is there any solution to his problem without adding a FAT hdd?
How are people with Win2k flashing their bios'?

 

[SufferinSuccotash]

Why in the world should the filesystem type matter? (That's a rehetorical question.) The computer should boot from a floppy whether I've got a FAT, FAT32, Ext2, or SufferinSuccotashFS filesysystem. Its the BIOS that starts the boot process before the OS is even loaded. If the BIOS is set to look for a boot record on the A: drive first and finds one, it will (should) completely ignore the HDD. Perhaps there was another setting in your BIOS that you overlooked... a quick-boot feature, maybe?

 

[Zirgon]

There is not quick boot type of setting in my Cmos. I dont like having to put in a fat formatted HDD too boot to dos, but I do not have any other choice.

Zir

 

[Bozo Galora]

(I KNOW I shouldn't get involved here}

Booting into Windows (Non NTFS) is a 10 step process.
1. Scan drive A, then &quot;C&quot; then something else.
2. If reading C, load MBR (master boot record) - If reading &quot;A&quot; skip down two.
3. Execute MBR data, find bootable partition in MBR
4. Load DOS boot record (DBR), the first sector in the DOS partition or the first DOS bootable sector on your floppy.
5. Control is passed to DBR
6. DBR directs to the loading of &quot;hidden&quot; IO.sys and MSDOS.sys - 90% of DOS
7. IO.sys loads all other hidden files
8. IO.sys loads and interprets config.sys, incl. device drivers
9. Unless diverted by shell statement, DOS loads command.com from &quot;C&quot; root dir.
10.Command.com loads autoexec.bat

As is readily acknowledged, DOS does not recognize the Microsoft NTFS files system - the files above are simply not available in NT exclusive HDDs on NTFS (NOT Win 98-2K dual boot) Thats why you are advised to setup a new NT HDD on a machine already running it for easy setup. No DOS, no command.com action. The &quot;FAT32 HDD&quot; the previous guy mentioned was a bit misleading. He meant FAT32 WINDOWS/DOS HDD.

Thats why they give you three setup floppies with NT4 - you need all the specific bootloader files (non DOS)

But NT (windows2k) does have a command prompt - command.exe
This is a very extensive code that is a lot like JAVA.
You can command prompt in NT the bios flash, but you gotta learn a lotta command info.

Some of the mobo makers are now posting a self running no-DOS/no floppy bios flashing utility, to be run while in NT or 2K. The prog has the latest updates for ALL their mobo's. They have simply put all the command.exe commands you need into an auto executing file, knowing full well most people couldn't do it on their own, especially now that 2K has sold 3 million copies.

 

[Bozo Galora]

And heres one of those mile long MS links:

(Go to #28)

http://search.microsoft.com/us/Default.asp?so=RECCNT&amp;qu=Win2k%2C%20command%20prompt&amp;boolean=ALL&amp;i=00&amp;i=01&amp;i=02&amp;i=03&amp;i=04&amp;i=05&amp;i=06&amp;i=07&amp;i=08&amp;i=09&amp;p=3&amp;nq=NEXT&amp;fqu=PROMPT%26COMMAND%26%22windows%202000%22

 

[Panther]

<< But NT (windows2k) does have a command prompt - command.exe
This is a very extensive code that is a lot like JAVA.
You can command prompt in NT the bios flash, but you gotta learn a lotta command info. >>



I knew this but I thought the entire point of booting straight into dos was that no high level memory managers were loaded? If I update the bios from the pseudo dos of Win2k won't there be a whole bunch of high-level junk running which might interfere with the process? Every bios procedure guide put out by various mobo manufacturers that I've ever seen distinctly warns against having memory managers loaded.

 

[Bozo Galora]

There is NO DOS in Win2K
NONE NABBIT NADA ZERO ZILCH
No partial DOS, No near DOS, no virtual DOS

 

[Bozo Galora]

If you doubt you can update bios while in fully running Win2K, go to ASUS and download Liveupdate326.zip (1.32MB)
I believe if you press control/F5 with Win2K during boot (I know it works in 98) you can start program &quot;stripped&quot;, to run your own command prompt bios flash.

 

[Bozo Galora]

probing, insightful, illuminating question of the day:

Why would they call it &quot;LIVEupdate&quot;

 

[SUOrangeman]

Bozo, cmd.exe in WinNT/2K is a DOS emulator ... of sorts. Just to expound upon earlier comments.

-SUO

 

[damien6]

I'm running Win2k (Pro + Server = NTFS) and I never had any problems using Win98 bootdisk to boot into dos so I can flash update the bios. It doesn't matter what OS/file systems is on the HD when booting with a &quot;bootdisk&quot;.