XP asks to insert disk in A: on login

[Ed Shallenberger]

I just rebuilt my daughter's pc and installed a new motherboard. After that
win98 would not run in normal mode and would not "see" the CD drive in safe
mode or from command prompt. Did not have original Win98 media, so could
not reinstall -- decided to skip that and upgrade to XP. But the only way
to see the CD was to boot from a floppy. From there on XP installation went
well enough, but now once the welcome screen displays any user logon results
in a dialog box displaying the following:

"SAS window: winlogon.exe - No Disk"
"There is no disk in the drive. Please insert a disk into drive A:."
"Cancel" "Retry" "Continue"

If you put a floppy in A: logon coninues with no further problem -- it
doesn't matter what kind of floppy or what sort of files are on it, as long
as it is a readable floppy.

As long as there is no floppy in A:, no matter which button you click, the
dialog reappears. But if you click on "Continue" three successive times,
login proceeds without further problems.

I have not been able to figure out why XP wants to go look for a floppy at
this point, and I would like to find and fix the instruction that seems to
be causing this so I can give the machine back to my daughter without her
having to deal with this silly quirk. Can anyone offer some help here?

Thank you very much.

 

[S.Sengupta]

Check it here:-
'"Please Insert a Disk into Drive A:" Message Continually Appears When
Starting the Computer'
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q282470

regards,
ssg MS-MVP
pronetworks.org

 

[Charles Crume]

Hi Ed;

The article also says "exit the floppy drive in Windows Explorer before you
restart the computer". Perhaps you were you using Explorer, had a floppy
open, and somehow the computer was restarted.

If this is so, I would expect this message until Explorer is opened and
floppy exited properly. I'd say it worth a try.

HTH.

Charles...

 

[Sharon F]

Thanks for the good try, but this article does not apply. It advises
clearing the "Restore previous folder windows at logon." checkbox in Windows
Explorer. On the computer in question that checkbox has always been open.
But thanks for trying.

Ed

Ed, look in her startup folder, Recent Documents and Start> Run list to see
if there's anything there pointing to the A: drive or a file with the A:
drive in the path. If found, delete. To clear the Start> Run list, use the
"Clear History" button Internet Options. This is an old Windows bug that
pops up now and then in XP and clearing shortcuts from these places sets
things right again.

If still no luck, check settings in the antivirus program and set it to
*not* scan the floppy disk on startup.

IMPORTANT: If she's in the habit of bringing home floppy disks that come in
contact with other (possibly unprotected) systems and leaving them in the
drive at shutdown, you will probably want to leave this setting enabled and
just have her keep a blank floppy in the drive to get past that startup
problem. Better to let the antivirus program earn its keep than to be
sorry.

 

[Ed Shallenberger]

Thanks, all who have offered help, but none of these suggestions have
changed the picture yet.

Any other ideas, I am still willing to try anything that might help.

Ed

 

[Sharon F]

Thanks, all who have offered help, but none of these suggestions have
changed the picture yet.

Any other ideas, I am still willing to try anything that might help.

Ed

Ed, two things from your original post still stand out to me:

1) The message at startup is: "SAS window: winlogon.exe - No Disk" Any idea
what this SAS is? Found these links on google but don't know if it applies:
http://www.indiana.edu/~statmath/stat/sas/win/1.html
http://support.sas.com/documentation/onlinedoc/v7/wincomp/z0530735.htm
Any idea if this was a part of the Win98 installation? If yes, consider a
clean install instead. You don't have a Win98 disk (stated in your previous
post so will have to work that out somehow).

Or are you using a customized XP CD of some kind provided by your
daughter's school or another source? Check with the source for more info on
SAS.

If there is a SAS application involved in this mix somewhere, you should be
able to disable this from running at startup using Start> Run> MSCONFIG.

2) Last idea: Perhaps something to do with the method used to convince the
cdrom drive to cooperate in setting up this system is at the root of all
this. Now that you have XP up and running, you may want to try a repair
install.

How to Perform an In-Place Upgrade (Reinstallation) of Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;315341

NOTE: The above article applies to retail CD or a generic OEM CD. If your
Windows came preinstalled and your recovery media has been customized by
the manufacturer, check your system manual for restore/repair options and
for directions.