Hello everyone, Thank you for having a look at my problem.
My MUM wants me to give her a computer, so, I have quite a few old things hanging around. I decided to give her this one then that one, so on.
It doesnt have to be flash or anything special.... Just a computer that works. Pretty easy task you'd think eh?
Well, I cant get any of the hard drives to be recognized by either of the two computers Im working on
Now I know for a fact that the drives have an Operating system on them, that was working at the time they were removed.They are Win 98SE.

Specifically the Pentuim, 200 Hz, has a problem in the bios and WONT identify the A: drive and it reads Floppy Drive A: Failure,  F1 to enter setup.
When I enter there to check the settings, the bios says not installed and it doesnt seem to have any way to change that setting.
Am I not seeing the right way of doing this?

I can hear the C: Drive working/ spinning, but it wont boot past the A: drive section. There is a section in the bios to boot from CD drive, so I removed the A: drive and cable from the Mobo, set it to boot from the CD, and now it gets to O/S load in progress... but doesnt do anything.
I just have a black screen with "O/S load in progress" and a blinking cursor, and "Insert bootable media in the appropriate drive".
I put the win98 SE CD in the CD drive but it doesnt do anything? The CD spins and the lights flash but it doesnt go any further?

Any help to move further to GETTING this going would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you, ImnoguruWhat about changing the CMOS battery?That is an old computer 200 mhz.

Nothing wrong there just pointing out the age of the CMOS battery.AH yes, good thought, thank you street1, plenty of those about here.
Ive actually got a tester that says its fully charged too. ( However under load it may be different).
Well that didnt change anything REALLY.
Maybe I'll try a newer Win CD. Its only a 4 gig drive and a 2 gig slave, or I could try one of several other drives in the comp that might be LARGER tomorrow.

The C: drive , if it has an O/S on it, should load shouldnt it? So could the drive/s be incompatible: ie: IDE or different? The drives I have are all from the same dynasty!!
and why doesnt the CD drive register in the start up?
The light flashes and it spins? but doesnt read/load anything.
Where should the CD drive have its jumper, slave master cable?

Hmmm 32 meg of memory if I read it right, 32768 Kb? Not a lot.

The computer has found the C: drive:  Hard Disk 0 installed WDC AC32500H
Bios 1.00.11. DNOR 1992 - 1997 Intel,
American Megatrend
Packard Bell.
No beeps at the post.

Well any other suggestions please?
PS Ill read them tomorrow gotta go for now.
Thank you all for your help. ImnoGuru .
Well too old too hard  chuck it in the bin.


Moving on then.
Thank you