Win98 SE won't boot - HIMEM.SYS is missing.

[bUnMaNGo]

I have a Sony Vaio laptop running Win98SE, and I had to reboot to change some network settings. However, when I rebooted, it would give me this error, and then dump me at the command prompt:

Starting Windows 98...

Windows XMS Driver Version 3.95
Extended Memory Specification (XMS) Version 3.0
Copyright 1988-1995 Microsoft Corp.

ERROR: Unable to controle A20 line!
XMS Driver not installed.

HIMEM.SYS is missing.
Make sure that the file is in your Windows directory.


from that last line, I did a dir c:\windows\himem.sys and it showed up as a file 33,191 bytes, 05-11-98 8:01p

I don't see how simply rebooting would cause this to happen. I really don't want to have to reformat, especially since I don't have a cdrom drive for it- however I do have the setup cabs on another partition on the laptop. It would just be a pain in the butt to reformat, that's all. Any way I could make a "rescue disk" off of another Win98SE machine to restore it? Thanks in advance.

 

[Motorheader]

When I have seen that error it usually means one of two things:

1. Memory is going (gone)
2. DMA controller on the board is bad (in essence the MB)

Usually has been number 2 more than number 1 when it comes down to it. Can't do anything but replace board - in this case a PITA laptop system part.

Bump for you and good luck.

 

[bUnMaNGo]

an update: Safe mode works. I also tried a boot disk made from control panel -> add remove programs -> Windows Startup Disk. The first time I tried it, it had problems initializing the ramdisk. I hard booted, then it was able to create the ramdisk and load the utils. Now, instead of the error message I first posted, Windows tries to boot in an infinite loop- it automatically reboots midway through bootup, then boots again, dropping me at the boot options menu each time (safe mode, safe mode with network support, command prompt, etc). Does this mean anything?

 

[Motorheader]

YHPM