jaclaz

Do re-read slowly: Try selecting: INSTEAD of: What happens? jaclaz

For the record, newish versions of the excellent IMGBURN do burn Audio CD as well: http://www.imgburn.com/ so that would be everithing a normal user needs. For a Virtual Drive, besides FILEDISK: http://www.winimage.com/misc/filedisk64.htm and IMDISK: http://www.ltr-data.se/opencode.html http://www.boot-land.net/forums/?showforum=59 I normally use this one: http://www.slysoft.com/en/virtual-clonedrive.html jaclaz

NTLDR and NTDETECT.COM are backwards compatible, NOT forward compatible. I.e. NTLDR and NTDETECT.COM from XP can boot BOTH 2K and XP, whilst the 2K version won't be able to boot a higher version. When you installed 2K after XP, most probably the two files were overwritten with the 2K version, simply re-overwrite them with the ones from XP. jaclaz

You're welcome. And, for the record, history always repeats itself: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?sho...16754&st=21 the same "trick" was used to avoid "help problems" in Windows 3.1! jaclaz

If they are, than the "normal" IO.SYS has lettered the drive along what is stated in the MS KB. First thing rest assured that it is, at least theoretically, a "standard" configuration. There is no law whatsoever against having a drive with just a big extended partition. To avoid the drive letters changing when a new drive is inserted, from the "dawn of time" I have always formatted my hard disks with a smallish primary partition and all the rest one big extended partition, with one or more volumes in it. This way, when I used the drive as second or third hard disk I simply hid the primary partition, but when and if I needed the drive on that or another machine as first drive, I unhid that partition and I would have a bootable system without any need to re-partition or use third party utilities like partition magic. http://www.msfn.org/board/Files-for-bootin...6.html&st=2 http://www.msfn.org/board/Partition-to-rei...5.html&st=3 But the letter changing with the modified IO.SYS remains still a "mistery", the scope of the patch is to remove the problem that (actually not very often) happens in Win98 or Me when some "non-standard" partitioning schemes (or to be more exact logical volumes inside extended partitins with "wrong" CHS or LBA access) are used, fdisk does not create this situation AFAIK, but other "advanced" third party utilities may do that. If you used fdisk to create your paritioning scheme, your setup should be "kosher", and the patch, while correcting a possible problem, creates another one. Since letter assigner was developed of course we have no more any problems with drive lettering, and we can rename them at will under 9x/Me just like we are used to in NT/2K/XP, but your experience suggest that this patch should be used ONLY if the double lettering happens, and NOT as an "upgrade" patch. jaclaz

Use a "dummy" .exe: http://www.hydrous.net/weblog/2007/06/23/d...windows-exporer jaclaz

Use another Virtual Drive, like IMDISK: http://www.ltr-data.se/opencode.html http://www.boot-land.net/forums/?showforum=59 Since it supports command line it should be easy to add a virtual drive with it, if you supply an image file to it, if you need just a CD virtual drive, you can use Virtual CloneDrive: http://www.elby.ch/en/fun/software/index.html which should add a CD virtual drive and assign a drive letter to it even without "media" loaded. jaclaz

It's strange. I don't think there is a way to "assign" letters with fdisk. And what you report, besides not being following the MS KB is also different from common experience: http://www.msfn.org/board/Drive-letters-sh...d-H-t85729.html The fact that letters remain the same even when booting from floppy should mean that no software like letter assigner is changing drive letters, and thus the only explanation could be if the partitions on second and third hard disk were logical volumes inside extended. The fact that you remember changing drive letters in win2k appears to be consistent with this, as 2K (and XP/2003) use different rules for assigning drive letters: http://www.dewassoc.com/support/win2000/driveletters.htm which, would return in your case exactly the lettering scheme you are describing. jaclaz

Create the .iso with nlite. Possibly test it in a Virtual Machine of some kind (optional). Either mount it in a Virtual CD like this: http://www.slysoft.com/en/virtual-clonedrive.html (only an example, there are many other ones, filedisk, imdisk, etc.) Or use an archive app, like winrar or 7-zip to extract the contents of the .iso to a local folder, say C:\XPSOURCE\ Run the USB_multiboot_9.cmd and point it to the source folder or to the virtual drive. READ attentively the FAQs and the readme's inside the download. jaclaz

@zxian As I see it (but I might be completely and utterly wrong, of course ) the problem might be the "Express Card" thingie. What I am just speculating about and probably failed to express properly, is that the BIOS must be able to boot from the PCMCIA slot and accept an e-sata attached to it. And, once the "real mode" part has booted, there should be the need for an Express Card (read PCMCIA) driver and that for a sata driver, so we are in a situation similar to the "Boot from USB" where more than one driver is needed. A "direct" e-sata bus would not be a problem, I think, as e-sata is basically nothing but a connector for the normal sata bus to attach external devices, and as thus is supported by the "normal" appropriate sata driver. jaclaz

This is an entirely new "realm". Provided that the laptop BIOS allows booting from e-sata, the Dietmar's "XP on USB" procedure should work, with the needed changes: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=14181 If the e-sata bus is not bootable to BIOS, it should be possible to adapt the "XP Kansas City Shuffle" to it: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?sho...c=21242&hl= AFAIK there is not (yet ) a specific e-sata method/tutorial. jaclaz

If you reduce the source with nlite BEFORE running the USB_multiboot_9.cmd, you sure will get a reduced source: http://www.msfn.org/board/Install-XP-from-USB-f157.html The thing you MUST NOT remove is just the "Manual Install and Upgrade". http://www.msfn.org/board/FAQs-t116766.html jaclaz

If I may, why starting another Win98 minimization project? Doesn't Winimize suit you? http://winimize.com/ http://www.boot-land.net/forums/?showforum=53 Cannot say if it helps you, but the old excel file with some info is still available: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?sho...12326&st=29 http://home.graffiti.net/jaclaz:graffiti.n...TEST/donano.zip jaclaz

Good info. For the record, the guys at Symantec appear to use their time to blame on MS for the problem: http://news.idg.no/cw/art.cfm?id=1659E132-...19B3023FDD85185 http://www.computerworld.com/action/articl...T_AM&nlid=1 The culprit should be this fixccs.exe file. Due to the wide usage of Symantec products, expecially on laptops where they often come pre-installed, I find at least preoccupying that neither Symantec nor Microsoft found the bug BEFORE the SP3 release, and that, even after the reports, took so long to fix, and that the fix has to come from a final user, instead of coming from one of the two big companies the software of one of which must be the actual origin of the problem. jaclaz

Well, NO. Any hard drive IS partitioned, at least with ONE partition. So you have: C: -> First Active Primary partition (boot drive) on first hard disk D: -> Logical volume inside Extended partition on first hard disk E: -> First Primary partition on second hard disk F: -> First Primary partition on third hard disk So, theoretically and according to the MS information, drives should be lettered as following: First Primary partition on first hard drive ->C: First Primary partition on next (second) hard drive -> D: First Primary partition on next (third) hard drive -> E: First volume inside Extended Partition of First hard disk -> F: The reason why you have (normally) a different scheme of lettering remains a mistery, unless you have something else that assingns letters . A question (only if you have time and will to experiment, of course ): can you try to boot from a simple Win98 DOS boot floppy and check if drive lettering remains the same? jaclaz

I see. ...but I miss some more details to try and understand what happened... Drive lettering in general, and expecially with multiple drives depends also on the type of partitions (i.e. Primary vs. Logical Volume inside Extended) and filesystems used, not only type of filesystem but also types of partiion (CHS vs. LBA), usually depending on size of partition. This is the way it "should" be: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/51978/en-us and is consistent with your report if the second partition on your first drive is a logical volume inside an extended partition, and all other drives have not primary partitions, or if all partitions on all drives are primary ones. Since it is quite rare to find a setup with drives having only Logical volumes inside Extended, it is more probable the second idea, that you have all Primary partitions, which, in the case of first drive having two primary partitions visible by DOS/Win 9x/ME, is a "non-standard" situation. Where the meaning of "standard" is what FDISK would let you do. See this thread for some reference: http://www.msfn.org/board/Drive-letters-sh...d-H-t85729.html and particularly this post: http://www.msfn.org/board/Drive-letters-sh....html&st=20 where a possible explanation for different "drive lettering" order on different OS's is attempted. Most probably the patched files do "correct" this situation along the referenced MS KB also with multiple primary ones. jaclaz

Here is a quick comparison table: http://stream.uen.org/medsol/dvd/pages/dvd...at_DVDvsCD.html I guess that since after all it's an install procedure rather than a mere file copy, lots of other factors come into play, like bus, processor speed, quality of the media and accuracy of recording, etc. jaclaz

Try using IMGBURN for burning the .iso: http://www.imgburn.com/ Select LOWER available speed. jaclaz

Badly burned CD? Can you test the .iso file in a Virtual Machine? Which app did you use to actually burn the CD? At what drive speed did you burn the CD? Are you using CD media (make/brand/type) that you already used successfully on the same burner? jaclaz

Could you please post how your Hard drive is partitioned and how letters were before and after using the patched files? FYI, though unrelated: Letter Assigner: http://www.v72735.f2s.com/LetAssig/ jaclaz

What I would try to do: 1) use ycopy: http://www.ruahine.com/ycopy-file-copy-utility.html or Roadkol's Unstoppable Copier: http://www.roadkil.net/program.php?ProgramID=29 to copy contents of first cd (the original one) to a directory on hard disk, say C:\1stcd 2) save the log 3) repeat the copy with contents of second cd (the non-scratched copy) to another directory on hard disk, say C:\2ndcd 4) save the log 5) compare the the two logs and see if you have in one of the two created directories the "copied OK" files, and add them from one to the other, as to try and create a "complete" \i386 directory 6) try slipstreaming to the most complete \i386 directory you have latest service pack jaclaz

No prob, no hurry , IO.SYS has stayed like it is for almost ten years...... jaclaz

Yep, someone did think about that. Some links here: http://www.boot-land.net/forums/?showtopic=4774 jaclaz

If you still have that disk, and it has a "readable" \I386 directory, it's easy to make a bootable CD out of it, possibly also slipstrreaming to it latest service pack You can extract the boot image from your "scratched" disk, or get one searching around. Tool to extract boot image: http://www.nu2.nu/bbie/ Tutorials: http://web.archive.org/web/20050318033100/bink.nu/bootcd/ http://support.microsoft.com/kb/894950/en-us jaclaz

Just for the record, since you have to re-burn the CD anyway, this method initially devised by d4vr0s: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=20543 works very well, at least for a limited number of machines, eliminating the actual USB floppy drive. Basically you re-create the CD using a bootloader (I use grldr directly) instead of the "standard" "Microsoft Corporation.img" or "Arnes Boot record", and you add to the CD the needed floppy image(s), which can also be gzipped and thus will occupy a very small amount of space on cd. jaclaz