How boot to dos without floppy drive and no USB support in bios?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Mike Hollywood
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M

Mike Hollywood

I'm working on an older system, and can't get the floppy drive to work and
I want to boot to dos.
If I copy the contents of a boot floppy and burn a regular CD with it and
then tell the computer to boot from the CD, will it boot to dos?

Mike
 
I'm working on an older system, and can't get the floppy drive to work and
I want to boot to dos.
If I copy the contents of a boot floppy and burn a regular CD with it and
then tell the computer to boot from the CD, will it boot to dos?

Mike
Click to expand...
Does the old system have a workable windows install on HD? If so, you
should be able to press F8 just after the usual POST screens which
should then provide a menu of options, one of which is to boot to a DOS
prompt.
 
Pete,
Thanks for the F8 info, but I was wondering if
a "boot CD" could be made by copying the files
on a boot disk to a CD.
Mike
 
Mike said:
I'm working on an older system, and can't get the floppy drive to work and
I want to boot to dos.
If I copy the contents of a boot floppy and burn a regular CD with it and
then tell the computer to boot from the CD, will it boot to dos?

Mike
Click to expand...

Just google for how to make a bootable cd using your burning software.
Copying the contents of a boot floppy to a cdr is insufficient.

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http://www.abmdr.org.au/
http://www.marrow.org/
 
Mike Hollywood said:
Pete,
Thanks for the F8 info, but I was wondering if
a "boot CD" could be made by copying the files
on a boot disk to a CD.
Mike
Click to expand...

"Nero" provides this capability. Some other CD-burning programs do
not. I've used Nero to do this, and it works. You can either
replicate your bootable DOS floppy as a CD, or create a
(Nero-licensed) DR DOS (Caldera) boot CD. Nero provides both options.
 
Mike Hollywood said:
I'm working on an older system, and can't get the floppy drive to work and
I want to boot to dos.
If I copy the contents of a boot floppy and burn a regular CD with it and
then tell the computer to boot from the CD, will it boot to dos?

Mike
Click to expand...

The computers BIOS has to be capable of booting from the CD to be able to
use the disc. You can't just copy the files you have to make it bootable.
Nero and CD Creator are capable of this.
 
I'm working on an older system, and can't get the floppy drive to work and
I want to boot to dos.
If I copy the contents of a boot floppy and burn a regular CD with it and
then tell the computer to boot from the CD, will it boot to dos?
Click to expand...
In NERO for example, create a bootable CD and use a bootable floppy as
the source image. It'll then boot the CD the same as the floppy would
work. Just remember to include CDROM drivers.


--
Conor

If Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in darkened
rooms, munching magic pills and listening to repetitive electronic
music.
 
T Shadow said:
The computers BIOS has to be capable of booting from the CD to be able to
use the disc.
Click to expand...

So that's every PC since 1995 then.


--
Conor

If Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in darkened
rooms, munching magic pills and listening to repetitive electronic
music.
 
T Shadow said:
Your definition of old doesn't go before1995?
Click to expand...
Way before but booting from CDROM wasn't universally suppported before
then.


--
Conor

If Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in darkened
rooms, munching magic pills and listening to repetitive electronic
music.
 
Mike said:
I'm working on an older system, and can't get the floppy drive to work and
I want to boot to dos.
If I copy the contents of a boot floppy and burn a regular CD with it and
then tell the computer to boot from the CD, will it boot to dos?

Mike
Click to expand...

Why do you want to boot to DOS?

If you're trying to install a system on it and have another PC around, put
the hard drive in it as slave, make it bootable, and copy the O.S. setup
files (from the CD) to it. Then put it back in the old PC, boot it, and
install from it's own hard drive.
 
Why do you want to boot to DOS?
If you're trying to install a system on it and have another PC around, put
the hard drive in it as slave, make it bootable, and copy the O.S. setup
files (from the CD) to it. Then put it back in the old PC, boot it, and
install from it's own hard drive.
Click to expand...

That is almost too damn easy David.........:-) Forgot all about it. I was
looking at my backup array last week and saw a folder with the cd setup
files there and couldn't for the life of me figure out why I put them there.
Getting old is a bitch.........:-)

Ed
 
No. The system would also need a DOS CD-ROM driver to recognize the drive.
Click to expand...
WRONG.


--
Conor

If Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in darkened
rooms, munching magic pills and listening to repetitive electronic
music.
 
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