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Byteback
Drive failure
QUESTION: I have Windows XP, Service Pack 2 on Pentium 3, 930MHz with 256MB RAM. When I turn on my computer the following message appears: “Diskette drive 1 seek failure.” What does this mean and how can I solve it? What is a tracking cookie? Should I delete it?
Adnan Aslam
Lahore
EDITOR’S REPLY: First, make sure there’s no floppy disk in the drive (if you have a floppy drive). Second, check the cables of your floppy drive and the Bios settings.
Press “Del” or F2 at start up as soon as it lists the hard drives, etc. (Sometimes it can also be F9 or F12). The key(s) are displayed on the screen. Then look for the primary boot device and make sure the HD-0, HD-1, C\: or HD is the first primary boot device in the boot sequence. This error usually occurs when a cable is loose or the system configuration information may not match the hardware. Also ensure that you’re not using USB items like printers, etc. If so, disconnect those at start-up. Tracking cookies help keep track of where you have been and are safe to delete.
Multimedia presentations
Please suggest software that can be used for making multimedia presentations which also embed sounds.
Usman Jamal
Karachi
The simplest software for this is none other than Microsoft’s PowerPoint. Go into Insert>Movies & Sounds and you can insert music, movies and voices in the background. You can control these by Action Settings. For a more professional touch, you can use the Macromedia Flash 8 software. However, unless you’re a techie and have learnt Flash as a language, you’ll find it harder to control the scripts in here.
Voice changing
Please suggest software that can help me in voice-changing, from the microphone to my sound card.
Hafiz Ghulam Sabir
hafizsabir_99@yahoo.com
Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail. For this, you will require an editing software, which you can use to create effects that you like. The easiest ones are SoundForge 8 and Fruityloops. You can also try Audacity, the free audio editor and recorder from
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/.
Multiple queries
1. I have four partitions on my hard disk. I have WinXP SP2 on D and Win98 on C. The problem is that XP is running fine but Win98 has a problem. After the Win98 logo appears, it gives me messages in which files with the extension .VXD do not open and the following message appears: “Cannot find a device file needed to run Windows or a Windows application. The Windows registry or SYSTEM.INI file refers to this device file, but the device file no longer exists.” How do I solve this problem?
2. How can I format my C drive and reinstall Win98 on it, without affecting anything on the D drive?
Saad Sultan
saadajmalsultan@hotmail.com
First of all, your boot partition needs to be FAT32 to multi-boot with anything below Windows 2000, so please make sure it is. Double-click the My Computer icon on the desktop and right-click on your C drive and choose Properties. Look for the File System entry. Secondly, please make sure you have another partition which you can use to install Win98. After this, boot the computer using a bootable Win98 CD. Choose “Start computer with network support.” At the command line, type “setup.” Let the Windows installation run until it reboots.
Secondly, repair the Windows XP Boot Loader and do the following:
1. Create a Win98 Startup Disk.
2. Create a Notepad file with the following entries, exactly as shown:
L 100 2 0 1
N C:\BOOTSECT.DOS
R BX
0
R CX
200
W
Q
3. Save the file to the Win98 Startup Disk as READ.SCR.
4. Boot the computer with the Win98 Startup Disk and at the A:\ prompt type “DEBUG < READ.SCR”.
Steps one to four create the BOOTSECT.DOS file needed to boot Win98.
You may need to use the “ATTRIB C:\BOOTSECT.DOS -S -H –R” command if BOOTSECT.DOS already exists and you get an error when trying to recreate it.
5. Configure your computer to boot from the CD drive. This is done in the Bios or your computer may offer the option at startup if it detects a bootable CD. If your computer does not support booting from CD-ROM, you should also be able to boot with a 98 start-up disk and run WINNT.EXE from the I386 folder of your XP CD.
6. Insert your XP CD and boot from it.
7. You’ll see some files being copied; then you’ll be presented with a choice of installing or repairing an existing installation. Choose Repair.
8. You’ll be asked which XP installation you want to log into. Enter one. There is usually only one installation.
9. You’ll be prompted for the Administrator password. For Home, the default password is blank, so just hit Enter. For Pro, enter the same password you did during set-up for the administrator account. (This is not the same as the password for an administrator-level account. It must be the administrator account password.)
10. At the C:\Windows prompt, type FIXBOOT. You’ll be prompted to confirm. Do so.
11. When FIXBOOT is finished, remove the XP CD and type EXIT and the machine will reboot.
Reconfigure your computer to boot from the hard drive if necessary. You will now get the XP boot loader with your choice of operating system.
Bios
I have a Pentium 3 with VIA VT82C686B and a PhoenixBios chip. I tried to update my system’s Bios software, Award Modular BIOS v6.00PG, but it didn’t work. In fact, the Bios software got uninstalled. Now, whenever I try to switch on my computer, it asks for a media floppy disk to install Bios. Please help.
Pervez Ali Mirani
Larkana
The only fix left, if a flash has gone horribly wrong (which has happened in your case) and the computer fails to boot altogether, is to replace the Bios chip on the motherboard with a new one that contains a healthy and correct Bios. To obtain a new chip, contact your motherboard dealer and give them the model of your motherboard. In all likelihood, you used the wrong Bios version for your motherboard.
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