UNSOLVED
Emergency Boot Floppy
Problem: When I boot with an emergency boot floppy I can't access the hard drive
Background: I'm revisiting backup procedures for my small office, and realizing that I can't find boot floppies for the PC's in the office. In re-creating and testing them, I've discovered that none of the floppies that I create for my Dell systems will allow me to see the hard drive when I boot with them. Oddly, those created on the Gateway systems in the office will see the hard drive. Two of the Dell's are XPS R450 (Pentium II 450Mhz) running Win 95 OSR2. The other Dell is L600cx (Celeron 600Mhz) running Win98SE. One Gateway is a Pentium II 400Mhz running Win95 OSR2 and the other Gateways are older Pentium systems running the original Win95. Also, I've tried creating the boot floppies two ways. First was through the Windows facility for creating them, and second was from scratch (creating bootable floppy and putting appropriate files on it by hand). Both floppies have the same symptoms.
Questions: In the event I really need the boot floppies, is it important that I can't see the hard drive at this point? If so, how do I create a boot floppy that will work?
Thanks for your help!
Michael Blatt
Background: I'm revisiting backup procedures for my small office, and realizing that I can't find boot floppies for the PC's in the office. In re-creating and testing them, I've discovered that none of the floppies that I create for my Dell systems will allow me to see the hard drive when I boot with them. Oddly, those created on the Gateway systems in the office will see the hard drive. Two of the Dell's are XPS R450 (Pentium II 450Mhz) running Win 95 OSR2. The other Dell is L600cx (Celeron 600Mhz) running Win98SE. One Gateway is a Pentium II 400Mhz running Win95 OSR2 and the other Gateways are older Pentium systems running the original Win95. Also, I've tried creating the boot floppies two ways. First was through the Windows facility for creating them, and second was from scratch (creating bootable floppy and putting appropriate files on it by hand). Both floppies have the same symptoms.
Questions: In the event I really need the boot floppies, is it important that I can't see the hard drive at this point? If so, how do I create a boot floppy that will work?
Thanks for your help!
Michael Blatt
