Need help, building my first pc....

[Ray06492]

I'm building my first pc. I'm using an Epox 8kta3, T/bird 1.0 (retail)
Here is my problem. I'm NOT using a floppy drive. I get as far as trying to boot from a cd, and the machine hangs right there.

Any solution to this problem?

Thank you for your time,
Raymond

 

[Rostig]

Sorry, but I think you need a floppy drive in order to run fdisk, which will format and partition your Hard-Drive. You need a Windows boot disk to do this. I just built my first system too, and am about to build another. You can buy a floppy drive for about $10. I might be wrong about this, but I am pretty sure that you need a floppy drive.

 

[SemperFi]

Do you have a bootable cd? Windows 2000 cd should be bootable and you can partition and format off of it. I don't think the Win9x cd's are bootable. and you will have to do like Rostig says.

 

[michec]

The Win98/SE CDs are bootable, but you still need to have partitions properly formatted in either FAT or FAT32 before Windows can install itself onto the HDD. If you REALLY don't want to use a floppy, stick your HDD in another PC and format it there and then hook it up to your floppy-less PC. Win98 CD is bootable, and you will be able to install after that with no problem.

 

[SocrPlyr]

i am pretty sure w/ winME and 98se the thing will partion and format for you (i can't remember for sure tho... but that doesn't help if it keeps hanging...

good luck
Josh

 

[jodokast5300]

You have a ZIP drive?

Hehe......just go to your BIOS settings and setup a different boot device, floppy, ZIP, cd-rom, wahtever.

 

[BadThad]

What...no floppy? hehehehe

 

[shathal]

Win 98/ME will partition/format it for you? Hah - that will be the day.

Nah - you only get Disk-tools in "real" operating systems - that being (for Microsoft) NT and W2K.

Win98 and Win ME will not do that and can't.

I predict it hangs at the stage at which it wants to run scandisk - and can't because you do not have formatted partitions (or partitions at all).

Your options:
* Get a boot-disk (and thus, floppy) & do the FDISK/Format job.
* Format via other PC (i.e.: Partition Magic, W2K Disk Manager, etc.)
* (If you have it) Use W2K install to CREATE the partition (and format it), then abort the
install & do the 98 / ME install.

That's about it .

I would vouch for getting the Floppy-drive. It's one of the most reliable fall-back devices I've seen for years

 

[NelsonMuntz]

If you have access to a burner on another operating machine you could potentially make a CD into a bootable disk with the files you need to format and partition your hard drive. BTW without a floppy it sounds suspiciously like you are trying to make an iMac.