butter aka booter partition and setup routines

[jtdoom]

TRAIN once posted this...

I'll shamelessly copy it here.

If it is a Compaq.

Thank you for writing to Compaq Support Services.

Regarding your inquiry, please note that Compaq does not support hard disk drive upgrades for Presario desktops, nor do we have any BIOS or ROM updates to increase the size of supported hard drives.

It is possible to go to a computer dealer or repair shop in your area and see what third-party equipment they have that may be compatible with your computer. However, Compaq does not test third-party hardware or software and cannot support such a course of action.

Also note that Quick Restore disk will not work after replacing harddrive. If you cannot reinstall the original Compaq hard disk, you need to prepare the new hard disk for QuickRestore. Please be advised that this may not work for all hard disks and you may have unpredictable results for non-Compaq hardware. During the manufacturing process, an identification number (BOMID) is written to the UIA area of the hard disk. The BOMID identifies the model of the computer in which the hard disk is installed. Replacement hard disks do not contain this information. Therefore, when using QuickRestore on a Compaq Presario computer that contains a replacement hard disk, the QuickRestore program will be unable to identify the model of the computer.

SOLUTION
Follow the steps below to write the BOMID to the UIA area of the new hard disk:

1. Insert the QuickRestore diskette (when applicable) and CD into the appropriate drives, and then restart the computer.

NOTE: If a QuickRestore boot diskette is not included with the QuickRestore kit, you can create this diskette from the BOOTDISK subdirectory on the QuickRestore CD.

2. At the initial screen (Program Language Selection), select "Exit" from theQuickRestore utility.
3. At the A:\> prompt, type uiabomwr_xxx (where xxx is the BOMID of the computer), and then press Enter.

EXAMPLE: A:\uiabomwr 201 would store the 201 BOMID (for a Compaq Presario model 8772) into the UIA area of the hard disk.

If the BOMID fails, then your new hard disk does not support the ability to have the BOMID written to it. You cannot run QuickRestore without the BOMID. You should take the computer to a local Compaq Authorized Service Center to have a replacement hard disk installed that supports QuickRestore. This would require the original spare part to be installed.

NOTE: On future versions of QuickRestore CDs, the uiabomwr.exe utility will be located in the TOOLS directory of the QuickRestore CD.


Regards,
Compaq Consumer E-Services
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SMILE
and post back
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better have this info here than in a link which may get archived/dissapear.

for instance, Mosaic1's post on HP re-partitioning went footsie...

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Remember, there is always something we forgot to ask.
And, it's only FREE advice!

Kind regards, Jaak

[jtdoom]

have ran trials on a disk with more than four partitions, and fdisk /mbr should not be used on it.

(drive had one pri-dos, one extended, five logicals in the extended)

it got killed real quick...

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I think we forgot...

Kind regards, Jaak

[IMM]

Now that you've stomped it dead - you can practice retrieving the partitions. Try zeroing out the master boot (except the aa 55 signature) and rebuilding with a disk editor to point to one of them. (have a hex calculator handy - and it's easier on a < 8.4G drive).

[jtdoom]

IMM
you are way ahead of me in this respect.

hehe
you bet I ran a few trials of disktools I collected and put on floppy
One should have a MBR/partition table backup/restore tool in one's arsenal, and I bet you know of better tools than I do.

if I had programming skills, I'd know hex
alas, I don't know enough...
isn't it amazing that one can lose all data by changing just a few bytes?

anyway, the bulletin boards are once again brimming with issues about harddrives, and fdisking and such.

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I think we forgot...

Kind regards, Jaak

[jtdoom]

I recently found out about the functionality of DELPART.EXE

it can save partition info and has an undo.

I recently started trials on XP and win2000
(long ago, when i tried NT4 in my older system, which had SCSI then, I found that I needed too many driver not supported in the NT system. Win2000 looks cool, tho...)

hehehe, I killed the bootmanager a few times.
and that is what this bump is about.

when win98 was the original system, and win2000 gets loaded on other partition, one should know that formating the win98 partition kills the boot option.

you see, there are a few files added to root of win98 drive.
you wipe them, you lose some...

one ought to at least save these files... AND create the NT rescue set.

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It's caused by my Flemishness...

Kind regards, Jaak

[jtdoom]

here's the oficial source to delpart.exe
http://support.microsoft.com/default...;EN-US;q103049



------------------
remember, it's FREE advice...

Kind regards, Jaak

[Ridgerunr]

Hey Jaak!,,,thanks for reposting this,and also the add-on link.

Needs to be done occasionally to help newbies(and us ol'bies too ).Can answer a "lot" of unanswered questions for folks...

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Badges? We don'need no Steenkin'badges!!

[Train]

And for those of you who decide to make a bootable cd of these. A little trick I learned the hard way. Go into bios and swap your A drive to B drive save and exit make your cd and after you are done Go back in and change you floppy back. What happens is your cdrom will become A: and your floppy will not work. A real nasty surprise that is.

My cdrw worked as a cdrom, but no floppy when I needed it.

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SMILE
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[jtdoom]

Hi train
I must try that soonest.

what I did do a while ago was this.

booted off a win98 disk
I had xclone.exe on D:
then I did the following
D:xclone A: B:
et viola, I had the files I wanted off a win98 CDROM
(I wanted a copy of JO.SYS and FINDCD.EXE)

I wonder if one can boot off the CD if them floppy driveletters are swapped in BIOS...
as I said, soonest.

(fwiw, if for some reason BIOS detects no floppydrive (when there is one present) irq 6 gets masked. Using some tool someone wrote an eon ago, it can get unmasked. This masking happened when user had an LS120 in the machine. By calling this unmask thing in autoexec.bat he got his floppy drive letter back. )

------------------
remember, it's FREE advice...

Kind regards, Jaak

[Train]

Jaak
I had used the cdr and was doing a clean install to a new hdd.

The install was going good until I tried to use the floppy drive with my 3.1 floppies. Darn , Had to start over. Maybe if I copy the floppies to the cd. . . LOL


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SMILE
and post back
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[jtdoom]

just done it
after enabling swap in BIOS, booting off cdrom, without cdrom support
when that finished I was at A:\> prompt
drive B:\ (the real floppy) was functional

booted off floppy
once again, letter was a:\>
(of course, no B

what's bad about this is that some setup routines don't ever try look at B:

FWIW, I have preserved all sort of floppies to CDR

recently even got an old official CDROM (created by packard bell) which had all them floppies in it.

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remember, it's FREE advice...

Kind regards, Jaak