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hey someone help point me in the right direction. I'm on XP now. And I cant get to my BIOS/CMOS nor can I get into DOS mode.
except in start/programs/accessories/command prompt. but thats just that little window deal and it doesnt let you do anything.
what in the heck do I do. XP should have came with a damn manual.
haha xp sucks
Actually XP does come with a manual, at least if you buy it. However with pirated versions you get what you pay for :)
Anyways.... XP doesn't come with shutdown to MS DOS mode, just as Win NT and 2K didn't. This is because it is it's own operating system, without DOS. They feel you shouldn't need it. Now you can make a DOS boot disk (www.bootdisk.com), however if you have NTFS drives you won't beable to access them from DOS anyways, so you'll need NTFSDOS which has a freeware version that is read only, and a Pro version which is read/write but costs you a good chunk of cash.
As far as accessing your BIOS. That has nothing to do with your operating system. The choice to access your BIOS comes up before the computer even thinks about loading your OS. You would still access your BIOS in the same way you did before, usually DEL, ESC or one of the F Keys..
[EDIT]
How about justifying that, otherwise shut the ***** up because you really have no clue what you are talking about.... Damn n00bsQuote:
[/EDIT]
It did.. its called Help and Support and it does a damn good job answering my questions...!
Can anyone say DOS startup disk? ;)
jag291Quote:
To create an MS-DOS startup disk
The MS-DOS startup disk you create will allow you to boot into MS-DOS.
Insert a floppy disk into your computer's floppy drive.
Open My Computer, and then click the floppy disk drive to select it.
On the File menu, point to the name of the floppy drive, and then click Format.
Under Format options, click Create an MS-DOS startup disk.
Click Start.
Important
Creating an MS-DOS startup disk erases all information on the floppy disk.
Notes
To open My Computer, click Start, and then click My Computer.
The MS-DOS startup disk only allows the system to boot into an MS-DOS prompt. The disk contains no additional tools.
Damn you HT.. this is the second time we've posted so close to each other.. you got the answer too.. :)
I think you're stalkin me jag... :)
Point being...? ;)
Just kidding.. cheers!
jag291
Sometimes Bios can be tricky to get into. I have an older p2 computer that does not tell you when or what to hit on startup to get into the bios. Turns out you had to hit CTRL ALT ESC at the same time to get in. Best bet would be to look up your computer model online or bios version that scrolls on startup.
Am I, like, the only person who actually reads the doccumentation that comes with the computer? Most questions like this can be answered by browsing through all that paper that comes in the box.
Also, flame away if you feel like it, but I like XP. Not as much as I like my Red Hat box, but the one with XP on it works pretty damn well too. It's a hell of a lot better than ME at any rate.
EDIT: And the command prompt has an awful lot of versitility, if you just take the time to learn how it works and what it does.
Some manufacturers deliberately keek information on the BIOS away from users..
Access to BIOS setup is usually independendent of the OS.. though you can get prog to modify.. note also not a true function of the OS..
If you have a HP/Compaq, IBM .. the Del key won't get you into the BIOS Setup.. try F10, or F2..**** for that matter if neither of them work try the whole keyboard (sry last part attempted humour)
Cheers
thanks, I made a boot disk and was able to get into dos. but then the commands I was throwing at it werent working any who!! ex. I was trying to find a file called logo.sys actually its c:\logo.sys
I was told to type c:\>attrib *.sys but it didnt work, I guess that only worked for win98 and lower????
and now I have a new ? but should I ask it here, or in a new post. I dont want to become the only person asking questions.
here it is.
in windows...you have regedit. you can get to it by clicking start/run then typing regedit, but it opens, and you see the window for a few secs, then it closes. so i went to mycomputer/c:/windows/regedit and it opens and same thing. HOW IN THE HECK DO I KEEP IT OPEN??? c'mon guys, I know you all are way smarter than me so lets see what you got.
With a boot disk you will not be able to view your ntfs partition (assuming you formatted with ntfs for xp) which is why you can not find / access that file from a boot disk. If you are trying to change your splash screen, there are easier ways if I remember right, let me know if this is your goal. As far as regedit goes, sounds like a virus or some sort of malware is closing it to keep you from accessing or changing your registry. Run an AV scan of your choice, and I recommend running Ad-aware to check for spyware / malware found at: www.lavasoftusa.com (free for home users)
Regedit opens a new window which does not close by itself in normal circumstances.
Check your system for viruses and trojans ASAP.
There are a few out there that can cause this type of behaviour.
One thing to check manually is to see if you have infected versions of explorer.exe
If you search for explorer.exe, all the copies of it should be in your main Windows directory (C:\Windows on a default install). If you find them somewhere else as well, that is highly suspicious.
as far as logo.sys is concerned it doesn't exist in XP... only exists in win9x... you'll want to be looking for something called ntoskrnl.exe for XP if you want to change your boot up logo. But it's not as easy as changing logo.sys since ntoskrnl is protected by windows file protection system. Its possible to do it manually but its a bit of a fiddle. Far easier to use a 3rd party program. You may want to give a program called BootXp a look if you want to change ntoskrnl.exe
It's available at this place
http://www.bootxp.net/
some of the DOS commands from win9x won't work on XP, for a list of the commands that do work with XP command line interface go here:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/h.../en/ntcmds.asp
Incidentally the attrib command does still work... but your example would not work because you didn't indicate that any parameters should be passed to the file, for example to clear the hidden file attribute on all files with a .sys extension present in C: you would type something like
attrib -h c:\*.sys
as for the problem with running regedit from start>run... it's not something I've ever encountered so i can't help on that one. My regedit opens fine, and stays open as long as I want. Maybe someone else will be able to help
Z
Just a few comments:
XP takes a bit of getting used to if you come from 9x/Me/NT4. I admit that my first impression was that it had "been delivered before the paint had dried" :)
It does have quite good internal help, but seems to be much more internet/online focussed than previous MS OSes?..............that might just be my imagination. It is very fast if you give it enough resource, probably 20% faster than 98se on a 1GHz box. (artificial benchmarks). I must admit to having some initial problems with drivers.
I have no problems with Me provided that you give it enough resource..........it is VERY greedy in my experience...........I run it on a PII/333 and PII/450 both with 384Mb of SDRAM and both boxes are stable.
I may be paranoid, but I have noticed that some manufacturers seem to be supplying kit with BIOS that is hard to get to and has had a lot of functionality disabled...........that's why I build my own these days.
I have also seen ex-corporate boxes with severe restrictions on them.
In both cases the motive is probably to cut down helpdesk calls?
The virus advice is very good though, and should be the first thing that you eliminate from your enquiries.
Good Luck
To tell the truth the only thing i dont like about Xp is the "teletubbies" look. I cant remeber where i first read that description but it kinda fits.
You can always tweak that soccer mom look using Style XP and etc.
i didnt try this with regedit but ive done it a couple of times with my C++ progs... anyway go into ms dos and type:
cd c:\windows\ {enter}
and then type regedit... and if there are any commands that you need to type with regedit do so by typing
regedit -whatever
hope this helps