98se problem - nasty power saving mode

[azagahl]

Please help with this annoying problem in 98 se I'm having on one PC.

Basically if I leave the computer alone a long time, like 30 minutes, the screen turns black with a cursor in the upper left corner. Almost like it's in DOS mode and trying to shut down, but can't. Anyway there is nothing I can do at this point to restore things. If I press Ctrl-Alt-Del it either reboots or says something like "Press Ctrl-Alt-Del again to reboot your computer".

I think this is due to power saving or something and I have no idea how to turn it off. I think it's due to Windows and not BIOS because DOS does not have the problem. I have weird BIOS settings like POS and G/STR2 but I have no idea what they mean. Also, I usually install windows with the /Pj (ACPI enabled) option, but I don't think that's related.

Any suggestions will be appreciated

[soldier1st]

turn off all power management from control panel/power management

power management is known to cause problems

[miko]

REGEDIT4

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Detect]

"ACPIOption"="1"

98 will only install on systems it recognizes as ACPI support was so patchy back in the day,

usually when i install i will stick this in the reg before installing the motherboard inf drivers,

btw, in Device Manager if you select 'view devices by connection' if it doesn't say

'Advanced Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI) BIOS'

at the top something is out of whack.

i had much the same problem as you for a while till i discovered the system was going into standby due to the 'System standby' setting in the control panel > power managment options mentioned above that simply wasn't there if i didn't set this reg key.