When the DOS mode SCANDISK.EXE version finds some problems, before starting to fix anything it asks to insert a floppy disk to save changes on it. The problem is, it is not possible to continue without saving the changes. There is an option to abort the save changes to FDD procedure, but it is not working. I had no opportunity to test English language Windows 98 version. But, all Polish language Windows 98 versions do have this bug, as far as I know.

If the SCANDISK was started by Windows during a boot, everything works right. But, if the SCANDISK was run from the DOS prompt, the save changes to a floppy disk is a must.

I've been using a Windows 95 SCANDISK.EXE version, and it works correctly. But it is not possible to peplace the Windows 98 SCANDISK.EXE file with it, because Windows 98 uses different command switches. I do not want to replace the SCANDISK file with the English language version.

I'm looking for solution I could apply on every Windows 98 running computer under my management, and there are quite many of them.

Edited July 7, 200719 yr by Sfor

What about scandisk from WinME?

But, does the Windows ME have the DOS version of the SCANDISK?

I'm not a Windows ME expert. But, it seems Windows ME uses GUI scandisk version, when booting.

Well, I don't know which scandisk WinME uses, but in the Win9x folder on the CD there's a textbased scandisk used by setup, which is different (about 100 kB bigger) from the W98SE version.

Well. I replaced the SCANDISK.EXE with the one I found on a Windows ME setup CD. Unfortunately, the bug still exists.

When SCANDISK is about to repair the disk it asks to show where it should write the changes undo file. The possible choice is A: or "cancel undo". In both cases it wants to insert a floppy disk in the drive A:. Then it returns back to the same A: or "cancel undo" window.

If the SCANDISK was started by Windows during a boot, everything works right. But, if the SCANDISK was run from the DOS prompt, the save changes to a floppy disk is a must.

According to this page the difference is the /CUSTOM switch, which just disables the 'undo' prompt.

So you could put a scandisk.bat in \Windows\Command, which contains

scandisk.exe /custom %1 %2 %3 %4

This will be executed rather than scandisk.exe.

Unfortunately, this is not exactly the truth. The /custom switch tells Scandisk to use SCANDISK.INI file located in the WINDOWS\COMMAND directory. So, the /custom switch will change the way Scandisk works exactly as set in the file. By default the undo file is disabled in the SCANDISK.INI file. All other prompts are disabled, as well. The /custom switch is used by Windows during boot disk checking. If I enable the prompts in the SCANDISK.INI file, they will appear in automatic boot scans, as well.

I've encountered yet another problem. The SCANDISK.BAT file is not run instead of the SCANDISK.EXE file, when a SCANDISK command is entered. I know the .BAT files were processed before .EXE files in the old DOS versions. But, now it seems to work some other way.