Pc Not booting

Ok i have been asked to look at a pc for a colleague from work its a very old IBM pc from 96 not to sure what the spec's is but it has a intel socket 7 cpu and about 38mb ram when i first put it on it told me changes was made to the hardware config and it whent in to the cmos. From what i saw there it was only picking up one of the HHD so i exited and switced it off to check the the connections but it was fine so when i put it on agen it keeps freezing after it checks the ram witch it says is successful it whont go in to the cmos or anything else i have tryd disconecting all none essentials and it still does the same thing. does anybody know of anything i can do.

Rathgar, Sorry to hear of your friends PC troubles. I do not know your/his circumstances, but a computer with so little RAM would be a challenge to anyone wanting to do anything online these days. I would cut my losses of I owned it and save my pennies toward a new system, even if it was basic. Are you in the IT business, or just attempting to help out a friend. Best regards,

Hi, If the machine is 1996 vintage it may well be running win9X or even Win 3.1…..there's a chance of course that it may be running DOS…. Assuming the machine has a floppy drive then use a boot disc (start up disc) to boot into a DOS prompt and then C: and hit enter to change to the C drive,then, cd\ and hit Enter to get to root…..you can then use Dir /w to have a look around and get to grips with the directory structure. (note the space is essential(between the r and the /) If you don't have a startup disc then you can download some from here: www.bootdisk.com Enjoy it should be great fun and a bit of a trip down memory lane…. Regards paws

Yes you can say im in the IT business im still studying at this time as to thr boot disc ill give it a try but im not so sure it will work since i cant get to the cmos it is supose to have win95 on it And there is a strange pic in the top right hand corner of the IBM screen that appears

Rathgar, I see you waiting onlne for Paws who is from the UK, only just waking up I would say. I am sorry, but it will be Paws that continues to assist you. Best regards,

Hi tallin was quite right! If you are having trouble in getting to the CMOS then immediately after pressing the power on button you will need to start tapping the F1 key approx once per second until the CMOS screen starts up you can then set boot priority to: Floppy drive as Priority one CD to Priority two and Hard drive as priority 3 (If you get a keyboard error then you will need to restart and adjust your timings on tapping the F1 key) Let us know how you get on. Its great working on these older machines, but as there are no security udates available for Win 9x you will need to be on your guard as the machine will be very vulnerable to attack. A separate disc image kept secure on external media is a wise insurance… Regards paws