Help with hot swap fdd/cd-rom

[TheCableGuy]

hey guys, help me out here:

Friend was messing with laptop and gone and lost the vmm32.vxd file( by the way, win 95 B, on a Gateway 2000 Laptop)
I'm trying to reload windows, but the damn cd-rom doesn't load on startup (can't boot to cd-rom, yes it's set in bios) I'm trying to boot off of a 98SE startup disk, buttt..., only one drive(fdd/cdrom) in at a time, so the drivers for the cdrom won't load their either. I'm a dos idiot, so any help would be appreciated. I think i can load mscdex from the win98 ramdrive, but i don't know the proper command to do so (remember, dos idiot)

Please help, It's her stepdad's work laptop, and he need's it running in a couple of hours!!!!


Thanks,
TheCableGuy

 

[Charles]

You should have Softex Bay Manager software installed right? If it's not installed check the Gateway Application CD.

 

[TheCableGuy]

I got nothing but my windows cd's/floppies (from 95b to win2k&Me)

 

[TheCableGuy]

^

 

[Rakkis]

If you want to do a clean install do the following
This is a bit messy but it will get the job done. You can always go in after and delete the unneeded files after the install is done. (shown in the last 2 steps)

1)Boot with the floppy and get to a prompt.

2)Transfer the system files from the floppy to the hard drive to make it bootable

A:\> sys c:\


3)Copy config.sys, autoexec.bat, cdrom driver(generic one that will most likely work is oakcd.sys), mscdex.exe to C:\

A:\> copy config.sys c:\
A:\> copy autoexec.bat c:\
A:\> copy oakcd.sys c:\ file name is wrong. it's something like.. oak cd.sys (shrugs) look at the files in the disk and see if a filename sounds like it.
A:\> copy mscdex.exe c:\


4)shut down the computer. fdd goes out.. cdrom with appropiate cd booting option in bios goes in.

5)boot up
when you do this you will see a lot of error messages flashing by.
this is due to config.sys not being able to access the file you did not copy.
pay no mind to this as you really dont need those files to boot with a working cdrom.

6) you should now be able to access the cd rom and start the windows setup utility


7) after installing windows open config.sys and autoexec.bat in notepad and delete the contents of the files. save and close the files.

8) delete mscdex.exe and the cd rom driver (oakcd.sys in this example)



The driver appropiate for your cd drive might be different than the one that worked for my drives. if the oak one doesnt work. just copy all the .sys files to C:\ as well

A:\> copy *.sys c:\



hope this helps


[edit: typo]

 

[Rakkis]

Something else just came to mind.
I'm using a Win95b system right now and I found the file in C:\Windows\system.

Before installing windows over, do the file copying I mentioned in the post above and before installing windows. do the following:

1) Go into the directory with the cab files in the windows cd

cd d:\win95
(i'm assuming D is the drive letter assigned to your cd rom drive)


2) Extract the file to the desired location:

extract /y /a /e /l C:\windows\system win95_02.cab vmm32.vxd

3) Type: Win to load windows

if that worked then you can go ahead and delete the files you cpied from the floppy like the above post says. if not. format that puppy