VOGONS


First post, by Falcon_H

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Hello!

An embarrassingly long time ago, I scored an IBM PC-XT. It had 640k of RAM, a SCSI drive, and monochrome graphics when I bought it. I later installed a Hercules clone. The hard drive had been wiped, so I decided that this clean slate was the perfect opportunity to install a CF card adapter. I bought a lo-tech CF card adapter (I had to unplug the SCSI drive, because it was interfering with the CF adapter BIOS) and began attempting to install DOS. I tried using virtual machines, bootable USB tools (I think rufus is the one I used) and even plugging the card into a laptop and using disk images on USB drives to install DOS on the card. I got a brief taste of victory when I got the PC-XT to say "starting MS-DOS" , but it hung up indefinitely. I eventually admitted defeat and seceded that I would try using floppies, but I then discovered that the floppy drove is broken.

The PC is able to boot to BASIC and the CF card's bios seems to work fine and recognizes my card, so I doubt the problem is hardware related. Does anyone have any guesses what I am doing wrong?

Thank you for the help!

Reply 1 of 15, by derSammler

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Which version of DOS did you try to install? On my IBM PC (5150), I had to use DOS 5.0. Older versions would simply not boot from flash memory and also froze the system.

Reply 2 of 15, by Falcon_H

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I was using 6.22, if I remember correctly.

Reply 3 of 15, by boxpressed

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Did you use the fdisk /mbr command when initializing the CF card?

Reply 4 of 15, by Falcon_H

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Thank you! That must be the problem! What commands do I need to do?

Reply 5 of 15, by boxpressed

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Falcon_H wrote on 2020-01-19, 20:42:

Thank you! That must be the problem! What commands do I need to do?

I can't quite remember, but I believe you do it in this order:

fdisk /mbr
fdisk
format c: /s

Here's another similar thread:
Can't Boot from Compact Flash

Reply 6 of 15, by Falcon_H

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Thank you!

Reply 8 of 15, by MAZter

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Falcon_H wrote on 2020-01-19, 20:04:

"starting MS-DOS" , but it hung up indefinitely. I eventually admitted defeat and seceded that I would try using floppies, but I then discovered that the floppy drove is broken.

I had same problem with Compaq LTE5300 laptop (hangs and endless floppy use). EZ-Drive installation helps me.

Doom is what you want (c) MAZter

Reply 9 of 15, by SpectriaForce

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boxpressed wrote on 2020-01-19, 20:53:
I can't quite remember, but I believe you do it in this order: […]
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Falcon_H wrote on 2020-01-19, 20:42:

Thank you! That must be the problem! What commands do I need to do?

I can't quite remember, but I believe you do it in this order:

fdisk /mbr
fdisk
format c: /s

Here's another similar thread:
Can't Boot from Compact Flash

This should be made sticky on this forum 😀

Reply 10 of 15, by Falcon_H

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Thank you for the help, everyone! Today I was able to make another attempt at getting the CF card working. I booted a modern laptop from the CF card and added the master boot record. When I put the card in the PC, it actually worked! I get a message that says " to install MS-DOS, insert setup Disk 1 into drive A and press CTRL+ALT+DEl."

I have the three setup files, but I am unsure how to proceed from here.

Reply 11 of 15, by Caluser2000

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Did you follow the instruction and put in the first Dos setup disk? What three files are you talking about? Disk images?

There's a glitch in the matrix.
A founding member of the 286 appreciation society.
Apparently 32-bit is dead and nobody likes P4s.
Of course, as always, I'm open to correction...😉

Reply 12 of 15, by Falcon_H

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Caluser2000 wrote on 2020-01-23, 02:48:

Did you follow the instruction and put in the first Dos setup disk? What three files are you talking about? Disk images?

Unfortunately, I do not have a working floppy drive, so I am unable to follow the instructions. The files that I mentioned are the disk images (.IMA files) . I got them from this website: http://www.thelegacypcproject.com/software.html

Reply 13 of 15, by Falcon_H

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bump

Reply 14 of 15, by schmatzler

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The .IMA files are just archives. You can extract them with a modern PC and 7Zip, for example.

Maybe you can just put all the files into one directory on the CF card and run the setup from there?

"Windows 98's natural state is locked up"

Reply 15 of 15, by Falcon_H

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Thank you!