kikipcs wrote on 2020-05-13, 16:18:

First off - I used Master CD no. 170586 on my PB (has a 640 motherboard). Haven't had a chance to try it out in VM, though. I bu […]
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benheaven wrote on 2020-05-13, 12:23:

Hi, […]
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Hi,

Have tried different Master CD's etc and the universal boot disk. All restores succesfully but still get the flashing line when it gets past the BIOS.

Have done Fdisk etc.

Screenshots attached

Thanks

First off - I used Master CD no. 170586 on my PB (has a 640 motherboard). Haven't had a chance to try it out in VM, though. I burned the CD at 4X (the slowest my burner allows) and everything went fantastic, except that after installing the OS it does another hardware check. We shouldn't be bothered by that just yet, though - don't worry.

As for the blinking cursor, well, try this: after the restoration is complete, eject the CD and the floppy, power down.
Insert a DOS boot floppy, power up, let it load into the command prompt, and then go to the C drive. Then:
1) open the AUTOEXEC.BAT file and gimme a screenshot of its contents;
2) head to C:\WINDOWS and try to run WIN.COM - see if it will boot into Windows.

You also might want to try something a little bit different - after formatting the drive, re-boot to save the changes (you ARE rebooting the PC after formatting, right?) and let it load into the command prompt. Insert the CD and head to the [CD drive letter]:\DOSMENU\ and run RESTORE.BAT. Try it out, tell me how it went.

By the way - your screenshots sure did clear a lot of things! Initially I thought that the "cursor" was in fact a mouse cursor, whereas it's not - it's a flashing underscore. (maybe it's a language discrepancy thing)
You definitely should re-check the jumper settings and the settings for the hard drive in BIOS - if your HD is set to slave (with, let's say, a CD drive in Master) your PB will never boot from it.

And hey - if push comes to shove and we won't be able to figure out anything, I've got an idea - how about I make a HD image with a working installation of W95 (with all the PB bits installed, of course) and send it to you? Let me know what you think.

Best of luck!

If you can send me an image that would be fantastic 😀

Thanks!!

kikipcs wrote on 2020-05-13, 16:18:

First off - I used Master CD no. 170586 on my PB (has a 640 motherboard). Haven't had a chance to try it out in VM, though. I bu […]
Show full quote

benheaven wrote on 2020-05-13, 12:23:

Hi, […]
Show full quote

Hi,

Have tried different Master CD's etc and the universal boot disk. All restores succesfully but still get the flashing line when it gets past the BIOS.

Have done Fdisk etc.

Screenshots attached

Thanks

First off - I used Master CD no. 170586 on my PB (has a 640 motherboard). Haven't had a chance to try it out in VM, though. I burned the CD at 4X (the slowest my burner allows) and everything went fantastic, except that after installing the OS it does another hardware check. We shouldn't be bothered by that just yet, though - don't worry.

As for the blinking cursor, well, try this: after the restoration is complete, eject the CD and the floppy, power down.
Insert a DOS boot floppy, power up, let it load into the command prompt, and then go to the C drive. Then:
1) open the AUTOEXEC.BAT file and gimme a screenshot of its contents;
2) head to C:\WINDOWS and try to run WIN.COM - see if it will boot into Windows.

You also might want to try something a little bit different - after formatting the drive, re-boot to save the changes (you ARE rebooting the PC after formatting, right?) and let it load into the command prompt. Insert the CD and head to the [CD drive letter]:\DOSMENU\ and run RESTORE.BAT. Try it out, tell me how it went.

By the way - your screenshots sure did clear a lot of things! Initially I thought that the "cursor" was in fact a mouse cursor, whereas it's not - it's a flashing underscore. (maybe it's a language discrepancy thing)
You definitely should re-check the jumper settings and the settings for the hard drive in BIOS - if your HD is set to slave (with, let's say, a CD drive in Master) your PB will never boot from it.

And hey - if push comes to shove and we won't be able to figure out anything, I've got an idea - how about I make a HD image with a working installation of W95 (with all the PB bits installed, of course) and send it to you? Let me know what you think.

Best of luck!

Tried launching win.com from Dos floppy. Comes up saying isn’t supported on version 7 or below of DOS.

Also tried the restore.bat asks if you want proceed with restoring your system and below says bad command or file name....

Thanks

benheaven wrote on 2020-05-13, 16:42:

If you can send me an image that would be fantastic 😀

Thanks!!

That's going to take some time, sadly. I've got all hell (AKA college) falling down on me, and I can't run away. I'll get down on it in any free time I have.
But if we're gonna do this image thing, I'll need some info so I can set stuff up.

- Your hard drive is 4GB, so for safety reasons I'm going to make the image 4096 MBytes. Is that okay with you?
It would be most convenient if you told me your HD's sector, head, and cylinder values.

- Can you tell me the model number of your motherboard? Different models have different onboard graphics chips, so I'm going to need that bit of info.

- The motherboard will come preinstalled with standard AZTECH modem/SC combo drivers. Is that okay?

- The Master CD I'll use will be the same I mentioned - 170586. It's a Multimedia install. Furthermore, it's Win95A so your hard drive will be split into two 2GB partitions. Hope that's okay, too.

Other than that, just keep your eyes peeled on the notification. Hopefully it won't take long.

Cheers!

kikipcs wrote on 2020-05-13, 17:19:

That's going to take some time, sadly. I've got all hell (AKA college) falling down on me, and I can't run away. I'll get down o […]
Show full quote

benheaven wrote on 2020-05-13, 16:42:

If you can send me an image that would be fantastic 😀

Thanks!!

That's going to take some time, sadly. I've got all hell (AKA college) falling down on me, and I can't run away. I'll get down on it in any free time I have.
But if we're gonna do this image thing, I'll need some info so I can set stuff up.

- Your hard drive is 4GB, so for safety reasons I'm going to make the image 4096 MBytes. Is that okay with you?
It would be most convenient if you told me your HD's sector, head, and cylinder values.

- Can you tell me the model number of your motherboard? Different models have different onboard graphics chips, so I'm going to need that bit of info.

- The motherboard will come preinstalled with standard AZTECH modem/SC combo drivers. Is that okay?

- The Master CD I'll use will be the same I mentioned - 170586. It's a Multimedia install. Furthermore, it's Win95A so your hard drive will be split into two 2GB partitions. Hope that's okay, too.

Other than that, just keep your eyes peeled on the notification. Hopefully it won't take long.

Cheers!

Thank you 😀

I will get over the information this evening for you. But all the above sounds fine.

kikipcs wrote on 2020-05-13, 17:19:

That's going to take some time, sadly. I've got all hell (AKA college) falling down on me, and I can't run away. I'll get down o […]
Show full quote

benheaven wrote on 2020-05-13, 16:42:

If you can send me an image that would be fantastic 😀

Thanks!!

That's going to take some time, sadly. I've got all hell (AKA college) falling down on me, and I can't run away. I'll get down on it in any free time I have.
But if we're gonna do this image thing, I'll need some info so I can set stuff up.

- Your hard drive is 4GB, so for safety reasons I'm going to make the image 4096 MBytes. Is that okay with you?
It would be most convenient if you told me your HD's sector, head, and cylinder values.

- Can you tell me the model number of your motherboard? Different models have different onboard graphics chips, so I'm going to need that bit of info.

- The motherboard will come preinstalled with standard AZTECH modem/SC combo drivers. Is that okay?

- The Master CD I'll use will be the same I mentioned - 170586. It's a Multimedia install. Furthermore, it's Win95A so your hard drive will be split into two 2GB partitions. Hope that's okay, too.

Other than that, just keep your eyes peeled on the notification. Hopefully it won't take long.

Cheers!

Thank you for the image downloading as we speak 😀

kikipcs wrote on 2020-05-13, 17:19:

That's going to take some time, sadly. I've got all hell (AKA college) falling down on me, and I can't run away. I'll get down o […]
Show full quote

benheaven wrote on 2020-05-13, 16:42:

If you can send me an image that would be fantastic 😀

Thanks!!

That's going to take some time, sadly. I've got all hell (AKA college) falling down on me, and I can't run away. I'll get down on it in any free time I have.
But if we're gonna do this image thing, I'll need some info so I can set stuff up.

- Your hard drive is 4GB, so for safety reasons I'm going to make the image 4096 MBytes. Is that okay with you?
It would be most convenient if you told me your HD's sector, head, and cylinder values.

- Can you tell me the model number of your motherboard? Different models have different onboard graphics chips, so I'm going to need that bit of info.

- The motherboard will come preinstalled with standard AZTECH modem/SC combo drivers. Is that okay?

- The Master CD I'll use will be the same I mentioned - 170586. It's a Multimedia install. Furthermore, it's Win95A so your hard drive will be split into two 2GB partitions. Hope that's okay, too.

Other than that, just keep your eyes peeled on the notification. Hopefully it won't take long.

Cheers!

Hi,

The image is downloaded and I’ve got Winimage.

Would like to test it on vmware what are the steps?

Thanks!

benheaven wrote on 2020-05-20, 10:46:

Hi, […]
Show full quote

Hi,

The image is downloaded and I’ve got Winimage.

Would like to test it on vmware what are the steps?

Thanks!

You're gonna wanna convert the file to something like VHD or VHDX, and then just set it as the image for your VM.
I haven't played with VM that much but I've heard that "raw" images often like to crap out on VMware.

kikipcs wrote on 2020-05-20, 22:20:

benheaven wrote on 2020-05-20, 10:46:

Hi, […]
Show full quote

Hi,

The image is downloaded and I’ve got Winimage.

Would like to test it on vmware what are the steps?

Thanks!

You're gonna wanna convert the file to something like VHD or VHDX, and then just set it as the image for your VM.
I haven't played with VM that much but I've heard that "raw" images often like to crap out on VMware.

Thanks might try it on Virtualbox

Bumping an older thread in hopes anyone can help here:
I have a PB Multimedia with a PB 640 motherboard, issue is that I don't have the original CD Drive.

Seems to have original sound card etc and for the purposes of at least restoring I removed any upgrades like my Voodoo 1 and the extra RAM (128mb max upgrade)...

I cannot seem to find the right floppy to be able to boot the master CD (6707430501) found on Archive.org here:
https://archive.org/details/mastercdenglish

I have used the universal boot floppy and other tricks found here to no avail, it simply won't copy the files over correctly and gets stuck on the "first boot" because it's unable to find the hardware to finish up unpacking and go ahead with booting...

At this stage I'm willing to offer rewards if anyone can help me fuel my childhood nostalgia dreams of yesteryear. Only ever had the basic PB software on my first MM 640 and now I have a maxed machine I'd love if I could retain the original software + upgrades to play some awesome period correct things on this P1 machine...

xxbeefydjxx wrote on 2021-08-15, 19:55:

Bumping an older thread in hopes anyone can help here: I have a PB Multimedia with a PB 640 motherboard, issue is that I don't […]
Show full quote

Bumping an older thread in hopes anyone can help here:
I have a PB Multimedia with a PB 640 motherboard, issue is that I don't have the original CD Drive.

Seems to have original sound card etc and for the purposes of at least restoring I removed any upgrades like my Voodoo 1 and the extra RAM (128mb max upgrade)...

I cannot seem to find the right floppy to be able to boot the master CD (6707430501) found on Archive.org here:
https://archive.org/details/mastercdenglish

I have used the universal boot floppy and other tricks found here to no avail, it simply won't copy the files over correctly and gets stuck on the "first boot" because it's unable to find the hardware to finish up unpacking and go ahead with booting...

At this stage I'm willing to offer rewards if anyone can help me fuel my childhood nostalgia dreams of yesteryear. Only ever had the basic PB software on my first MM 640 and now I have a maxed machine I'd love if I could retain the original software + upgrades to play some awesome period correct things on this P1 machine...

Hi there - hoping I'll be able to provide some input on this.

First off, the CD drive will cause problems as it's one of the things that utility executable checks and will stop the process on that stage, along with the sound card check. Other upgrades won't really affect the process though.

The "universal" boot floppy wasn't given much attention by me since I wrote it, honestly - and it's not perfect by any means. I should really take a look at it once more.

May I ask what is the GUI on that UK Master CD? I had never used any UK one and I am aware that there are 2 different versions, let's say, of the whole Master CD backend and that they differ. Could be that your CD simply doesn't work with that floppy. I could also try installing your image on my 640 and see what's what, though currently I'm on holidays, so you would have to wait for that.

kikipcs wrote on 2021-08-17, 06:42:

Hi there - hoping I'll be able to provide some input on this. […]
Show full quote

xxbeefydjxx wrote on 2021-08-15, 19:55:

Bumping an older thread in hopes anyone can help here: I have a PB Multimedia with a PB 640 motherboard, issue is that I don't […]
Show full quote

Bumping an older thread in hopes anyone can help here:
I have a PB Multimedia with a PB 640 motherboard, issue is that I don't have the original CD Drive.

Seems to have original sound card etc and for the purposes of at least restoring I removed any upgrades like my Voodoo 1 and the extra RAM (128mb max upgrade)...

I cannot seem to find the right floppy to be able to boot the master CD (6707430501) found on Archive.org here:
https://archive.org/details/mastercdenglish

I have used the universal boot floppy and other tricks found here to no avail, it simply won't copy the files over correctly and gets stuck on the "first boot" because it's unable to find the hardware to finish up unpacking and go ahead with booting...

At this stage I'm willing to offer rewards if anyone can help me fuel my childhood nostalgia dreams of yesteryear. Only ever had the basic PB software on my first MM 640 and now I have a maxed machine I'd love if I could retain the original software + upgrades to play some awesome period correct things on this P1 machine...

Hi there - hoping I'll be able to provide some input on this.

First off, the CD drive will cause problems as it's one of the things that utility executable checks and will stop the process on that stage, along with the sound card check. Other upgrades won't really affect the process though.

The "universal" boot floppy wasn't given much attention by me since I wrote it, honestly - and it's not perfect by any means. I should really take a look at it once more.

May I ask what is the GUI on that UK Master CD? I had never used any UK one and I am aware that there are 2 different versions, let's say, of the whole Master CD backend and that they differ. Could be that your CD simply doesn't work with that floppy. I could also try installing your image on my 640 and see what's what, though currently I'm on holidays, so you would have to wait for that.

Hey Kiki,

Thanks very much for replying, I have spent hours modifying both the original Master Floppies and the Universal one you made, I did manage to get the CD to boot and I got a blue DOS like GUI, the one that has the options to restore fully using a restore code (the 5 digit ones on the backs of the machines, which mine works with that UK CD), however after restoring it would get stuck at a "C:\PISETUP " Screen.

This once again seems to point to bad CD Drivers attempting to install or something?, however looking at the issues posted on UKT Support under the PB 900 "Master CD" Section, it explains this very issue and it being related to a SmartDrive issue: http://www.uktsupport.co.uk/pb/faq/900soft.htm

I too get busy from time to time but am more than happy to collaborate on this to bring more solutions to fellow PB Owners. Perhaps in DMs or via Discord if you have that?

To be honest it's been a while since I last dabbled in this and would need to refresh my memory, what did what etc. I'll burn the UK Master CD and check it myself, then let ya know what it did.

Come next weekend I'll sit down to it when I come home from holidays, then we can do a Discord or just bump DMs, alright?

Cheers!

kikipcs wrote on 2021-08-20, 13:19:

To be honest it's been a while since I last dabbled in this and would need to refresh my memory, what did what etc. I'll burn the UK Master CD and check it myself, then let ya know what it did.

Come next weekend I'll sit down to it when I come home from holidays, then we can do a Discord or just bump DMs, alright?

Cheers!

That sounds like a plan, I wish you luck!

If you hit the same bump I did, you will notice that the restore seems to run out of memory and doesn't fully restore the machine however it does do a significant chunk.
every time when this happens the machine will reboot and get stuck at the PBDriver folder in Windows, you get left on a dos prompt and no further so it's likely a mix of incomplete restore and bad autoconfig/batch scripting.

My discord is xXBeefyDjXx#2383, Hoping to hear from you soon 😀

kikipcs wrote on 2021-08-20, 13:19:

To be honest it's been a while since I last dabbled in this and would need to refresh my memory, what did what etc. I'll burn the UK Master CD and check it myself, then let ya know what it did.

Come next weekend I'll sit down to it when I come home from holidays, then we can do a Discord or just bump DMs, alright?

Cheers!

Hey Kiki,

I cannot reply to your DMs via Vogons, because the site says I have not been active enough. Eager to chat with you soon.