"half_pint" wrote in message
...
Well I tried that. If I realised how long it take to move
the tempory internet files I don't think I would have bothered!
And not I will have to move them back again :O(

Anyway on my mine it goes

Detecting primary master: WD32343 (name of the drive)
Detecting primary slave: [none]
Detecting secondary master (CDRW name)
Detecting secondary slave (CDRW name)
(and then the usual stuff on the screen)

So...not finding a drive does not appear to be a problem.
Indeed when I booted with no hard drives.

Detecting primary master: [none]
Detecting primary slave: [none]
Detecting secondary master (CDRW name)
Detecting secondary slave (CDROM name)
(and then the usual stuff on the screen)

It then trys to boot from the master CD drive and asks me to
insert a boot disk etc....


Now you say you get a c:\
I am unsure how you did this, as mine would just wait for
a floppy so it seems your master drive has been detected
properly.
I *assume* you have a c:\ prompt which I think, means you
have booted up into DOS.
If this is the case it would be useful to know the content of
your autoexec.bat file and the other files which run at start-up,
as it would seem the problem may be there.
I am not a 'DOS'person' (or windows lol) so may be someone
else can help there. (config.sys? ) mayve system.ini and
win.ini too but they are bigger files.

No, maybe I made a typo. I can't get to the c:\, so I can't check any files.


Also I am not sure what happend with your system, does it
stop after you get the 'not detected' message?
Or does it report the cdroms as whit mine? ( I assume she has
a cdrom).

It goes through the other reports including the cdrom. But stops right after
that.

I am not sure what 'GoBack is either and what 'window' you
are in? (The BIOS set-up window?)

GoBack is a program that Gateway includes which allows you to go back to
where you were before you made a change if that change creates a problem. It
is the same as a restore program or cd. So the GoBack is working and the cd
with the restore information isn't working either.

Anyway, is your master drive reported at boot up?
Also as mentioned, boot without any and see if it says
Primary *master* not detected
If it does then I would ignore the message about the slave.

The master drive is reported. I haven't had a chance to boot without the
drive yet.

My windows scandisk is c:\windows\scandskw.exe nowever
I assme it will only run under windows so will that be anyhelp?
Or is there a dos version? or does it do both? I don't know.

My computer runs scandisk just by typing scandisk at the c:\, but since I
can't get to the prompt I haven't been able to run it.

Also as has been mentioned, did it ever work and if it had, had
she made some 'improvements' recently.

Yes, has worked fine for about 3-4 years. They have made no recent changes.
Thanks for all the time you are spending on my problem.

Helene