Cetin,

Thanks for the detailed reply. I have tried the following during boot-up (with the keyboard connected and no disks in the CD and floppy drives:

F1 during the boot process.
F2 during the boot process.
Esc during the boot process.
Del during the boot process.
Ctrl + Alt + Esc during the boot process.
Ctrl + Alt + Ins during the boot process.
Ctrl + Alt + Enter during the boot process.
Ctrl + Alt + S during the boot up process.
Page up during the boot process.
Page down during the boot process

None of these combinations have kicked me into CMOS setup... I am at a loss as to how to get there. I have a Compaq Presario model 5457.


>Allan,
>Causes are many. Let go step by step from basic ones (it's a desktop I hope - with laptop some steps are beyond you). Below mostly assume it's an EIDE system.
>-Turn on and go to setup (usually 'del' at startup)
>Select Standart CMOS setup (Might vary depending on BIOS and brand)



>You'd see Primary master, Primary Slave, Secondary master and slave settings
>Check if type read 'auto' (and mode read auto)
>If not set to auto and try to boot as normal.
>
>-If that doesn't work go to setup again
>Select Integrated pripherals
>Check if onboard PCI IDE primay and secondary are enabled or not. Enable them if not.
>Try boot again.
>
>-If that doesn't work go to setup again
>Select IDE HDD Autodetection
>Check if computer can identify disks (if not identfied all values would be 0)
>
>While above are not true for every computer works for the most.
>
>If above not worked
>-Open the case (and leave it open thinking it's summer)
>-Check HDD cables, seat both ends firmly
>-Try another go
>
>If didn't work HW issues are not finished but goes beyond you I think.
>
>For software part you'd need a DOS boot disk with a version 5.0 or before + a utility like Norton diskedit.
>If you have them boot to DOS. Run diskedit and from Object/Drive select 'physical disk', HDD 1st and check Cylinder 0, Head 0, all Sectors. Normally only first sector should have parttion data and rest should be all 00.
>If not it's a high indicator of partition infection (most known ones are Pegasus, Crazy boot and Istanbul CC). If that's the case you should clean it. But I think I shouldn't go further remote.
>Cetin