Why can't I re-install Windows 98?

Dave's Answer:

To address this question about such an old OS, I asked a number of Windows support experts for their suggestions...

It is possible that your floppy disk is bad; they are relatively fragile, and this is one reason (the other is small size) that they are being phased out on newer computers. Some copies of Windows 98 came with bootable floppies, some did not. Thankfully, most copies of Win98 are bootable from the CD. This started changing shortly after Win98 came out, as more and more computers were built that would boot from the CD drive rather than the floppy drive. This was done with newer versions of the BIOS, which is software that resides on the motherboard, much like Windows resides on the hard drive. The BIOS is basically responsible for telling your computer that it is a computer, and that it needs to look here (bootable media such as a hard drive) for an operating system. It also does other things (this is where the computer's clock resides, and usually the BIOS has some measure of password protection that is actually better than what is offered in Windows), but its other functions aren't really important for this issue. It is likely that you can change your computer so that it looks for a bootable CD-ROM, making the floppy disk unnecessary. However, you do need to go into your system's BIOS in order to change this.

This is a relatively easy procedure; however, it is important that you do not change any other settings unless you know what they are! There are also at least as many different "models" of BIOS as there are computers, so my directions can only be pretty generic. When you first turn on your computer, there is a message such as "Hit DEL for setup" (many generic motherboards) or "Hit F10 for setup" (on many newer HP computers such as my laptop). This will bring up the BIOS. There are usually a few different screens. Go through them until you find a selection labeled "boot order" or something similar. Pick the selection "CD, hard drive, floppy disk," or "D, C, A" (assuming you have not changed any drive letters). Then save your settings (the key for this is usually at the very top or bottom of the screen) and reboot the computer. The system should ignore the floppy drive and boot directly from the CD.

This is only one possibility. This answer assumes that all parts of your system are healthy. What I don't have are answers to questions like "Why did you have to reformat your hard drive?" or "Were you able to reinstall Windows, or do you currently have a blank hard drive?" Knowing these things would help me create a better answer. For example, there are many reasons that you would have needed to reformat your hard drive; none of them are ever good, and may indicate a problem with the hard drive. If your system is not recognizing the floppy and/or the Windows CD, it is possible that something has happened to your motherboard. And the list goes on...

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Probably, you will have to configure your BIOS to allow booting from the CD to start the installation.

You can enter BIOS by pressing the DEL key when the computer is in POST state. That is when the computer first boots and you see all your drives.

When you enter the BIOS you will see a screen with a number of options. Using the arrow keys, go where it says "Advance BIOS Features" and press "Enter".

In there look for a setting called "First Boot Device" , press "Enter" and a smaller screen will popup allowning you to select the device that the computer will use to boot. By using the arrow keys choose "CDROM" and press "Enter"

Then navigate to where it says "Second Boot Device" and press "Enter" again. The same screen will popup allowing you to select the second boot device your computer will use. Choose "Hard Disk" and press "Enter" again.

Then press F10 to save the changes and exit. When it asks you if you want to save the changes press "Y".

The computer will then reboot , using the cdrom and the windows installation will start.

You will see a screen that asks you if you want to boot from the CDRom or the Hard Disk.

Using the arrow keys again pick CDROM and press "Enter"

The installation will now start.

For more information about BIOS settings you can look here and here for good tutorials.

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You have to partition the disk before you can install Windows 98 on it. 2000 and XP do this as part of the setup, but with 98 you must use fdisk to set up the partition. Here is a tutorial on using fdisk.

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1. Make sure the Win 98 floppy disk is good. Many times when a floppy will not boot it is the media itself. They make 'em cheap these days. Try it on another PC to make sure it will boot the system. If the floppy turrns out to be the problem, see if you can make another on a friends PC that runs WIN98.

2. Likewise for the CD. See if it can be read in Explorer on another PC.

3. If the media are OK, check all ribbon cable connections in the PC. Sometimes they will work loose and just reinserting firmly will reconnect the drive(s). Once in a great while the cable itself will be bad. New IDE ribbon cables can be had real cheap at most PC supply places like Radio Shack. A PC tech can help you with this. A good PC shop should be able to test the cable(s).

4. If cables are OK, check the floppy drive. See if another diskette will boot in it.

5. If any or all of the above do not work, you may have a hard drive problem requiring the expertise of a PC technician or PC guru friend. If the Hard Drive is shot - new ones are getting cheaper by the day. If this is an older PC just be sure the BIOS will support larger hard drives. I'd contact the manufacturer of the BIOS. You will see the BIOS manufacturer on boot-up when the POST test runs and all that text-looking stuff runs by on the screen. It
will usually tell you to hit some key like F2 or F11 to enter BIOS. It might be a good idea to do this and make sure that your boot sequence is set to boot from a floppy disk first.

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Sounds like the boot order in the BIOS of your system is set to boot from the hard drive first, and hence isn't trying to boot from the floppy or CD.

The BIOS of your system is software built into a flash chip on your motherboard. It runs a basic check of the components on your system at boot up, called Power On Self Test (POST, commonly used as a verb by techs, as in "it POSTs" to describe a system that gets through the POST successfully). The BIOS is also responsible for initializing the hardware on your system, and then passing control onto the boot device containing the operating system of the machine.

Enter the BIOS configuration screen on your machine. To do this, you need to hit a certain key or combination of keys at the very first screen when you turn on your computer. Most machines will tell you which key, though some do not. Typically it's F1, F2, or Delete, though there are various other possibilities. Refer to your system manual if none of those three work.

In your BIOS setup screens, there will be a screen specifying the boot order. Change it so the floppy drive and CD-ROM drive are tried before the hard drive. Assuming the system supports booting from CD like most modern systems do, the Windows 98 CD is bootable so you shouldn't need a floppy disk at all. Booting from CD is much faster and less problematic than booting from floppy. If you aren't sure how to change this, refer to your system manual. It varies widely between systems.