jaclaz

Short answer: NO Long Answer: NO, but this has nothing to do with Windows 9x, is a "feature" of DOS: On the SAME drive that was booted MUST reside: IO.SYS MSDOS.SYS Autoexec.bat Config.sys and, normally, COMMAND.COM (but this can be changed through a setting in Autoexec.bat): http://goforit.unk.edu/msdos/msdos09.htm The same reason why you cannot rename "Autoexec.bat" to, say, "myauto.bat", those filenaes are encoded in the DOS files, and they must be on THAT same partition. Nothing prevents you however to make a c:\autoexec.bat like this: CALL D:\Autoexec.bat Moreover, though I cannot say if it useful in your "context" Windows 98 can be installed "completely" to a Logical Volume inside extended partition: http://www.allensmith.net/OS/XOSL/II.htm#II1 of course you will need a boot manager to hide partitions preceding the one on which you installed Windows 98, or those ones need to be with a filesystem that Win98 won't recognize, but the drive booted will remain "C:". Another interesting approach could be the one hinted here, though I never tested it for this particular purpose: http://www.geocities.com/freedatarecovery/ http://www.v72735.f2s.com/LetAssig/index.html but again, since the Letter Assigner has to be invoked from Autoexec.bat, you will however need to have it on the initial boot "C:" drive. jaclaz P.S.: to check version of a .dll/.exe/.ocx, check this also: http://lbrisar.htmlplanet.com/e_cmd32.html#top

You should be able to do that by modifying WINNT.SIF, see this: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=84617&hl= jaclaz

You simply install NT/2K/XP/2003 in the Logical Volume inside the extended partition, the arcpath in boot.ini will already be correct, otherwise you can easily fix it manually, read here: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=43610 http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=68193 http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=33030 and given links. But you can always boot the system with a boot floppy and fix the MBR from within the booted windows install. One of the posts above referenced has a link on how to make a boot floppy to start a NT/2K/XP/2003 system with corrupted boo.ini/NTLDR/NTDETECT.COM. There are several programs, freeware, for DOS and for Win32, the one I use is DSFI/DSFO part of the DSFOK package: http://members.ozemail.com.au/~nulifetv/freezip/freeware/ that has the options to do more than just the MBR, but MBRFIX, see links on my page: http://home.graffiti.net/jaclaz:graffiti.net/ or Roger Layton's MBRWizard will do as well: http://mbrwizard.tripod.com/ About Primary partitions, YES, you just set it as Active (checking that there is no other Active partition), i.e. you write hex value 80 in the proper location of the partition table, this can be done with any hex editor or with specialized programs. The one I use under Win32 is Beeblebrox: http://students.cs.byu.edu/~codyb/ About Logical Volumes inside Extended partition, THE "EXTENDED" PARTITION IS NOT A PARTITION, it is a "CONTAINER" for one or more Logical Volumes, see this: http://www.ranish.com/part/primer.htm The short answer is NO, but the long one is YES, but you need to manually arrange some parameters with a Hex editor, read this: http://www.goodells.net/multiboot/ or use a Grub4Dos: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?sho...c=17144&hl= (search on 911cd board for "Grub4dos", you will find many useful hints and tips) jaclaz

Please note that, PROVIDED you are willing to have a SMALL FAT16 partition you can have: 1) DOS 6.22 installed in that Primary partition 2) Windows 95/98/ME installed in a logical volume inside extended partition (YES, it can be done, it's a bit tricky, but it can be done) 3) ANY number of NT based OS, NT/2K/XP/2003 (installing in not primary partition is possible and easy) 4) ANY number of Linux based OS (installing in not primary partitionis is default) 5) BeOS on another primary partition 6) You still have a "spare" Entry in partition table. If you don't need/want Dos 6.22 the "small" Priamry partition can be FAT32. The above can be done with a simple bootmanager, like the standard NTLDR, or Grub4DOS that has more features. Cannot say about MacOS X, but since it is Linux/Unix based it should be possible also. jaclaz

I think you got this wrong, if I were a virus and wanted to destroy data on your disk I wouldn't care being able to READ actual data (i.e. no need to have a filesystem driver), I would just write "random" values to your hard disk through RAW write access. Yes, this is done in a number of embedded systems, nice idea ,but probably won't work with Win2k/XP, as they usually need Write access to the MBR, but I am not really sure about this , maybe they need this only during installation to write, besides MBR code, the Disk Signature. The idea of having "expendable" data in the first 1 or 2 Gbyte helps also because it takes time to wipe or write values to a hard disk and there is a possibility of "pulling the plug".... jaclaz

Just for the record, it is possible to use SOFTWARE Raid even if you don't have a Raid enabled motherboard/controller: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=52012 jaclaz

At the moment, Grub4Dos does work on NTFS, it seems like that tests with Vista NTFS formatted partitions has led to finding some problems, so it has been suggested to NOT use Grub4Dos on NTFS partitions. The dropping of NTFS support is planned, but not yet implemented, if in the meantime either MS releases some details of NTFS or independent projects like ReactOS will make progresses it is very possible that NTFS support won't be dropped. However, since something like 12 years, I personally follow the GOOD advice from Gilles Vollant (the authour of Winimage and of BOOTPART) of always having a smallish First Active Primary Partition FAT16 and install NT based system on a Logical Volume inside Extended Partition, and this has saved my data more than once, as it makes MUCH easier to fix the boot "part" (pardon me the pun) when a problem arises. Moreover, as I continue telling everyone (mostly unlistened to ) having the system and data on a Logical Volume is safer if a "dumb" virus strikes, see here: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=22526 http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=33964 Yes, correct, but you can use grldr.mbr instead of the ones I suggested. The "problem" with grldr.mbr is that it is 6,144 bytes long, so it occupies apart from the MBR sector, also the following 11 "hidden" sectors, this makes it incompatible with a certain number of Commercial utilities that WITHOUT ACTUALLY TELLING YOU use these sectors for storing some data, if I recall correctly, Partition Magic and Acronis are two commonly used ones that have this behaviour. The two bootmanagers I suggested, besides being Freeware, are contained in MBR 512 bytes. @jim0615 Yep, that's actuallly the idea behind the WHOLE thread. For the record, if you want to read the little experiments I did with the help of sisal, starting from here: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?sho...4181&st=603 You'll find an almost complete solution, that of course needs to be custom adapted to your particular setup. jaclaz

Yep, the intended link was this one : http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=41208 Sorry for the mis-copying. However, I quicly contacted the International Society for Cow Protection: http://www.iscowp.org/ and they assured me that NO cow, mad or sane, was actually harmed in the process, so everything should be well now. jaclaz

What I use is Grub4dos as a boot manager, chainloaded by the normal NTLDR: http://grub4dos.jot.com/WikiHome this avoids the need of as it can boot an image file, but you can use a one-sector-only replacement MBR, like PARTITA: http://www.pedrofreire.com/crea1_en.htm or the newly revamped OS-BS, now renamed mbldr and Open Source: http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=162108 About freeware alternatives to Ghost, in my view, best options are: Win32 SelfImage http://selfimage.excelcia.org/ site is down at this moment, get it from here: http://icculus.org/homepages/kfitzner/selfimage/ http://icculus.org/homepages/kfitzner/self...lfImage-111.zip DriveimageXL http://www.runtime.org/dixml.htm Linux PARTIMAGE http://www.partimage.org/Main_Page Support for NTFS is still tagged as "experimental", but I never had a problem with it. both following mini-distros use PARTIMAGE as the main tool: SystemRescueCD http://www.sysresccd.org/Main_Page PING http://ping.windowsdream.com/ However you hit the nail right on the head, it appears that all freeware apps are slower than Ghost: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=16534 though things have bettered, but of course if your time is precious, I guess you can pay for the Ghost license. jaclaz

Well, no, the idea is similar, the difference is that you can make everything with freeware or Open Source Software. jaclaz

I beg your pardon? jaclaz

Yep, it is also possible that on a system with a relatively small amount of RAM, disk swapping increased, and that would reduce system "responsiveness" to a crawl. Just to give you an example I tried once the same "reduced", normal and UPXed windows 2K setup on three machines: 1) VIA EPIA with 533Mhz Processor, 256 Mb RAM, ATA 66 drive 2) VIA EPIA with 1000Mhz Processor, 512 Mb RAM newish (at the time) ATA100 drive 3) "standard" ATX with 2,8 Ghz AMD Processor, 512 MB RAM, ATA 133 Drive on 1) the UPXed version was slowish once a few apps were loaded, most probably for the combined effect of CPU overhead and to the HD swapping (not enough RAM) on 2) the speed difference was negligible, could not distinguish between the two on 3) the UPXed version was apparently a bit faster I did not actually made any measurements , the above were just my "feelings", at the time what I was interested into was to build a minimal Win2K that could fit in a ZIP disk, the "final" version running from ZIP disk, proverbially slow, was definitely faster in the UPXed version. I wonder how this would play with XP on newish fast processors and SATA drives.... jaclaz

@jdoe This is not necessarily true, given the relatively slow transfer speed of disks when compared to the relatively high speed of today's computer processors, the "break even point" must be calculated. The real problem with UPXed files is the amount of RAM that is needed to run them, and a general form of "dirtying" memory pages, that could lead to instability problems, you will find this small article interesting: http://f0dder.reteam.org/packandstuff.htm @Francesco Sorry to say so, but your idea is not really new: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=4120 the problem, you see, is that not all system files CAN be compressed, as some, apart from the considerations above exposed, won't simply work. Some work, with regards to a limited sub-set of XP files has been done in the Winbuilder (was Openbuilder) project: http://boot-land.net/forums/index.php http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?&showforum=22 but you will understand that extending that to the hundreds of files that are part of a full-blown XP is quite a HUGE amount of work, even because some files are not normally used and an eventual bug (compressed file that should have not) would take months to be discovered. Moreover, during development of UPX scripts in the said prohects, it has become eveident that some Windows 2003 files behave differently form XP SP2 one, it is possible that newish releases (Windows Update) of a .dll that was in the earlier version "UPXable" are not anymore. jaclaz

Vingren I have the feeling that you have not a correct view of what the MBR and FDISK do, if I may, I'll try and clear some points. 1) there is no such thing as a "C: split into 2-3 partitions", C: is the latter assigned to ONE of the partitions (more precisely First Active Primary Partition) of First PHYSICAL Hard Drive 2) The MBR consists mainly of two parts: 2.1) Some boot code, that can vary depending of the OS installed or if any boot-manager is installed 2.2) The "partition Table", i.e. an "Address list" holding the data about partition(s) on the drive 3) There are 4 entries available in the partition table, thus there is a maximum of 4 possible partiions on the Drive, unless ONE of the entries, instead of being a Primary partition is an "Extended" one. 4) First sector of Primary partition is the bootsector 5) The Extended partition has NOT a bootsector as first sector, but rather a "Secondary MBR", where more place for "Addresses" is given, these are referred to as "Logical Volumes" inside Extended partition 6) FDISK simply does the following: 6.1) Writes the boot code 6.2) Writes the address of partitions, dividing the Physical Hard Drive into one or more partitions 6.3) DOS/Win9.x/ME has the limit of making only ONE Primary pasrtition and ONE extended one (in which you can make more than one Logical Volumes, Freedos FDISK allows for more than one Primary partitions, only ONE Extended partition is allowed anyway 6.4) Writes the TYPE of partition, i.e. the filesystem that will be used on it, DOS has ONLY FAT16 support, whilst Win9.x/Me has both FAT16 and FAT32 support 6.5) Sets the Primary partition as "Active" or "bootable" 7) Each of the partition which address has been defined by fdisk needs later to be formatted by the FORMAT command or other similar utility, the FORMAT will create the bootsector and the filesystem structures 8) When the computer boots up the "boot code" of the MBR seeks into the "Partition table" for Active partition and passes control to its bootsector You might be interested in this thread: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=16713 An alternative could be using DISKPART from, as suggested, a PE build: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=80363 Or using a third party tool. Another possibility is to use Grub4Dos grldr as the no-emulation bootsector of the CD, loading a floppy image containing FreeDos/DOS/Win9.x/ME, FreeFdisk and grub.exe. Grub.exe has the possibility to chainload Windows NT/XP/2003 setupldr.bin without re-booting, so that you can have a "main" menu.lst, accessed by grldr, that automatically boots the floppy image, in the floppy image in autoexec.bat you put: a.) the free fdisk script you want b.) a call to grub.exe that loads another menu.lst that by default calls the SETUPLDR.BIN and starts the install Please note that you will have to experiment a bit with the above, since "normally" FDISK NEEDS a re-boot in order to update through BIOS the Partition Table. jaclaz

Just for the record: 1) There is no difference between NT based systems and other systems (apart the BSD type of slicing and Mac OS partitioning) the limit is 4 Partition ENTRIES in the MBR, these can be all primary or as much as three primary ones and one Extended one (in which you can make Logical Volumes) 2) The topic has been discussed many times already, if you search the board for topics with keyword "hidden partition" you will find some ideas and links to alternate programs/ways, also check these: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=18480 http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=12447 3) please note that there is a newish version (2.60) of bootpart on it's original page: http://www.winimage.com/bootpart.htm jaclaz

Well, well. @danw To resume your post: 1. You have a boss that tells you what the solution to the problem has to be, not caring if that solution does not exists or it is inferior to an alternate one. 2. You fail to see what the "open mindedness" of several different programmers can add to a recovery process. I will try and explain myself better, though I am NOT a professional in data recovery, over the years I have developed an interest in this branch, and quite naturally I have been in the Company I worked with the "reference man" when a problem occured on a Mass Storage device, so I claim to have some knowledge in this field. In my experience, not a single program, either Commercial or Open Source is "perfect", a software that succeeded 100% in an occurrence of data corruption failed miserably in another one, and vice-versa. Rules are as follows, as I see it: 1) ALWAYS make a bit by bit copy of the damaged media, if possible, make TWO of them 2) Run against the image EVERY single piece of software you can think of, starting with a program you know and trust, but do NOT overlook "minor" ones or "narrow" ones, i.e. those aimed to recovery just a certain type of file or a certain type of damage 3) Given the low cost of todays hardware, NEVER attempt repair on original media, only do it AFTER recovery was succesful on the copy, what you were not able to do might be possible 4) Do not EVER give up, I was able to recover data that "so-called" professionals had determined to be an impossible recovery, simply by using a different tool or making some minor manual corrections. 5) TELL the customer that recovery has MANY levels of accuracy and corresponding many levels of time involved and cost, explain him that even if a quick scan determined that no recovery was possible, a deeper analisys may give some results, data recovery if not successful with "easy - press one button and go" tools, manual recover is often possible, and in some cases even partial data can be of great help, all in all is a matter of the VALUE the customer attributes to lost data Programs I can swear by: TESTDISK (Freeware) File Scavenger (NTFS only -Commercial) TiramiSU (FAT16-FAT32-NTFS-ZIP disks - not anymore developed - Shareware - Commercial - acquired by Ontrack) jaclaz

Quite obviously, most "COMMERCIAL" data recovery programs are aimed to MS originated filesystems, whilst for *nix based filesystems most of the work is done by Open Source project/contributions. To this you add that until a short period ago, using Unix, Linux or BSD was "reserved" to people which know what to do, actually 2 words: BACKUP OFTEN! However there are such programs, here are a few: TESTDISK and PHOTOREC: http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec Disktype http://sourceforge.net/projects/disktype Foremost http://sourceforge.net/projects/foremost Fileextractor: http://sourceforge.net/projects/kkfileextractor Data recovery tools (ALPHA) http://sourceforge.net/projects/dr-tools Safecopy: http://sourceforge.net/projects/safecopy Hdrecover: http://sourceforge.net/projects/hdrecover FIRST: http://sourceforge.net/projects/first http://www.first.org.my/index.php?id=0 But I am quite sure there are many others. jaclaz

And don't forget this: http://johnson.tmfc.net/dos/ jaclaz

Yep, hopefully everything is OK, happy to see you again Fred jaclaz

Yep, that's why I suggested using an image. After all a presentation is nothing but a slide-show, you just add to it more images with the different filtering results and you are done. Moreover you are safer from a crash or a wrong command given, I know that it never happened before, I know, but if it happens, it will do the most possible damage, according to Murphy's Law and it's corollaries. jaclaz

Open your file in Excel Set it to full screen Press Printscr key Open Paint Edit -> Paste Save as bitmap Open bitmap in any more featured image editor and modify it if needed Save it again as bitmap or .jpg Add the image file to your presentation Repeat for more sheet views jaclaz

One. jaclaz

Have a look at this project too: http://winner.windowsdream.com/ jaclaz

Yep, as said, the BIOS did not appear to be the problem. In my experience first thing that can cause such a problem is actually RAM, you should try doing the following: 1) Remove all RAM from the system 2) AFTER having made sure that you discharged possible static electricity, use a rubber eraser, NOT the type for pencils, the "old" round shaped ones meant to coorect typewriter errors (they are slightly more abrasive) to clean contacts on the RAM sticks 3) use a GOOD, NON OILY type of spray contact cleaner to clean the sticks connectors on the motherboard 4) SWAP RAM sticks, i.e. put the one in connector #1 in connector #2 and viceversa 5) Run for at least 24 hours (of course if you can boot) memtest86: http://www.memtest.org/ 6) If ANY errors are detected, re-do from point #5 without the faulty stick 7) If NO error are found, try replacing the processor (with the one of the identical machine) 8) If it stil does not work, the motherboard is 99,99% a goner ALL the above tests must be made with the LEAST possible devices connected, i.e. Video Card (if not on board one) and Monitor, keyboard and mouse. Disconnect hard disk, floppy disk and, if you have multiple USB ports, the cable(s) that connect motherboard to front ones. Set the BIOS as "Failsafe Settings" or similar, disable LPT and COM ports, EVERYTHING. Then, if it works, re-enable or re-connect one by one the devices and ports. jaclaz

OK, just for the record, now that everyone has had his part of fun and hopefully mandrake10 has learned a few neat tricks, why not using a more featured, pre-made FREEWARE and OPEN SOURCE app?: http://gravityfx.org/ http://gravityfx.org/?id=projects http://gravityfx.org/?id=wxp (a .NET solution, so not really useful unless you need .NET for any other more meaningful reason) jaclaz