computer components & hardware - compaq armada 7400

"n6rpf" wrote in message
...

When I try to boot up, I get a message "not a system disk ..."
I have found that if I put a win98 install disc in the CD it will give
me the choice of booting from the hard drive, then I can run Win ME
which is on the hard drive but otherwise, it just says replace and hit
any key to start. The disc has to be in the tray on start up for this
to work. Is this a bios problem? How can I fix this?

First - nothing in Floppy drive - right ? No changes to BIOS boot order ?
BIOS does show HDD right ? I assume so,...

Your hard drive's boot sector, a specific location at the beginning of the
disk, contains the startup files Windows needs to get started. If Windows
can't find all of those files, the boot process stops . You need to "
repair the master boot block (MBR) " on the hard drive. It is the first
part of as disk drive that tells Windows "where the system starts" on your
disk drive and "how to get there". Search Google for (no quotes) " MBR
WinME repair "

http://www.bootdisk.com/ has lots of info.

I know about Windows 95, 98, Win2000, WinXP, but NOT sure at all about
Windows ME since I never owned it. It seems that your Win98 CAN read the
info on the hard drive so MAYBE you could use Win98's process, but do not
take my word for it.
Research online - compatibility for boot info between Win98 and WinME.

BTW when you have the disk booted, you should consider backing up your
data to CD since that Pc/drive is pretty old and may have other issues
soon.
Here's the first article I see when I search. It is talking about XP, but
the concept is the same.