More pics

And more pics 😁

Hello again,

So, next day and another 40 bucks spent ( as with old cars, you need money to buy it, and more money to make the darn think to work properly) i bought a 1 GB IDE Hard Drive, bunch on floppies, RAM sticks and 1 USB Floppy Disk.
The hard had Win 98 installed and the first thing that i noticed was it seems there is no MS DOS on the machine. Can you install Windows without having DOS first?
Anyway, after plugging in the Floppy Drive and the CD Drive as well, the Windows does not boot anymore, i get the "Type the name of the command interpreter" error.
It doesn't matter, i want to install MS DOS either way. I tried creating a MS DOS bootable floppy but apparently Win 10 on my modern PC does not have that feature.
Tomorrow i will try making a bootable USB to see if the USB slots from the Deskpro4000 recognizes anything. If not, i think i need to install an older Windows (XP) on another PC and create a bootable Floppy from there.
My second problem is that the Compaq does not have the BIOS installed. I found the software that apparently installs the BIOS menu but again, i cannot create a bootable floppy. I tried simply copying the Executable on a Floppy but when booting the Compaq it just says " Please remove any media. Press any key to continue".
I am a bit rusty with old software so any piece of advice is highly appreciated.

Have a great day,
Andi

You should watch a few a Phil's (philscomputerlab on youtube) videos on how to install dos and win 95/98...

Just make sure to get a few things at hand:
- Windows 98 CDROM
- Windows 98 startup disk image (Google is your friend)
- the program winimage (30day trial will do)
- Verified good floppy disk

I guess it's legal to get a win 98 floppy image from the net if you own a win98 license... In case you worry about this. I also think ms wouldn't mind.

Write the Windows startup disk image to a floppy disk using winimage. Copying files won't do, it won't write the boot sector.
Enable write protect on the floppy disk, just in case your new hard disk may contain any virus.

Start the computer, boot from w98 floppy disk with fdisk remove any partition on the hard disk. Exit fdisk.
Reboot with same boot disk.
Run fdisk again and create new partition.
Reboot, make sure to boot with CDROM driver enabled, and format hard drive.
Go to CDROM drive and install windows 😀

To get there bios into the hard disk I'm not sure. Usually Compaq had a setup file ("softpaq") to create a floppy that installs the bios into the hard disk. Most softpaq files are still available for free on the HP website, but searching for the right one can be a pain.
The procedure could be a little different from here 😀

Hello,

@Waterbeesje : At the moment i only want to install MS Dos, no need for Windows.
So, i made some progress.
I was able to create 3 working floppy disk with MS-Dos Version 6 using winimage.
The PC sees the bootable floppy at start but it says "Unable to install MS DOS. This might be because of a bad HDD/Cables or because you are missing some software/drivers". The Hard is working so i am pretty sure it's because the PC does not have the Bios installed. Furthermore if i write fdisk i get the "No fixed disk present" error. Again that makes me think without Bios installed I am unable to do much.
I found a way to install the Bios, down below, but i have not tried creating a bootable floppy using Win7 (you have that option there, unlike Win 10). I will try this step next and will let you know.
Pretty tricky so far, but i will get the hang of this.

http://seriss.com/people/erco/compaq-deskpro-2000/

I will keep you up to date.

--
Andi

It's quite annoying how these Compaq systems still used diagnostic programs for their BIOS settings instead of a proper bios menu. I can image that on a 80s XT class machine, but not a 90s Pentium system. Ah well, at least you can still download the floppy disk images.

As soon as you've set up the HDD in the bios, you should be able to use install MSDOS. Good luck with the build!

That's actually a really good guide.

I know a lot of the old Compaq softpaq's don't like Windows x64 and this has no chance booting off USB, but if you have a XP PC with a disk drive you should be on the right track again.

chinny22 wrote on 2020-10-12, 12:29:

That's actually a really good guide.

I know a lot of the old Compaq softpaq's don't like Windows x64 and this has no chance booting off USB, but if you have a XP PC with a disk drive you should be on the right track again.

Unfortunately i only have a Win 7. The Floppy has the option to "Create an MS-DOS startup disk" but it writes some bunch of files on the floppy and it's kind of confusing. I need to investigate the problem more.

So, I made some progress, but i did not fix the problem.
I tried creating a bootable Floppy like Debs told me, and the floppy boots and the install starts. But i understood how this shit works, when you run the "Driver".EXE, it only unzips and install the true driver (ROMPAQ) to another Floppy. So, i cannot install it because i need two floppy disks. the first exe installs the program to another floppy at the same time. I tried a bootable CD so when running the installation I can install it on a blank Floppy, but unfortunately the CD does not boot. It starts spinning, the ~ appears flashing, but then nothing happens and enters a "loading loop".

I also tried installing DOS BOX on my Win 10 PC, i mounted both installation folder and my external USB floppy disk. I am able to start the wizard, and when it prompts me to enter a floppy into A , it just says "Unable to recognize media" when entering a blank floppy.

Now, i have 2 options left. I either Install Win XP on another computer so i can run that exe and burn the Floppy and then use the floppy with ROMPAQ to boot the damn COMPAQ.
Or i can ask somebody in the Bucharest area who has access to an older windows and a floppy disk to run the installer for me so i can write the floppy and boot the darn thing.
Other than that, i am out of ideas.
Hope you understood the problem.

Thanks again,
Andi

Both your posts were getting painful for what only takes 5 minutes on my retro fleet, Actually surprised no ones done this already.

I've repacked the disk creation tool so you should now be able to create a disk in x64 version of windows.
Creating the disk tested fine on my Win7 machine but don't have a Deskpro to test further.

Let me know how it goes and if it works I'll post it to vogondrivers, can only see this becoming more and more common

Awesome machine. I used to own one back in the day, together with a Cyrix 166 mhz pc, and I could never decide which one was faster and more suited for gaming. I thought the Deskpro with it's 133 MHz Pentium CPU, because Intel is better. I was still a kid. I even swapped over the 3DFX Voodoo card to the Compaq and it worked great. I used to machine until 2000, when it was replaced by a Pentium 3. I remember GTA2 and Fifa 2000 running on that thing at the end of its lifecycle. Wish I still had it, its case looks very neat and clean.

Did you fix your issue with the Diagnostics disk? I had the same problem with my recently purchased Presario 4122, and I fixed it this way:

Deleted all partitions from the primary master drive.
Created a Diagnostics disk and a Setup disk (this latter one is the BIOS) on my Pentium 3 Windows 98 machine. Windows 98 reads those Softpaq packages just fine. I tried to create those disks on the Compaq itself after booting with a Windows 95 boot disk and a Dos 6 boot disk, but the disk creator always said that it could not locate command.com. It worked on my Windows 98 machine.

Then I booted the machine with the diagnostics disk. It immediately said that it could not find a Setup partition and asked if I would like to create a new one. I said yes, and after asking for both the Diagnostics disk and the Setup disk a few times, it rebooted, and now I can enter the BIOS by pressing F10.

Epirean wrote on 2020-11-01, 17:56:

Awesome machine. I used to own one back in the day, together with a Cyrix 166 mhz pc, and I could never decide which one was fas […]
Show full quote

Awesome machine. I used to own one back in the day, together with a Cyrix 166 mhz pc, and I could never decide which one was faster and more suited for gaming. I thought the Deskpro with it's 133 MHz Pentium CPU, because Intel is better. I was still a kid. I even swapped over the 3DFX Voodoo card to the Compaq and it worked great. I used to machine until 2000, when it was replaced by a Pentium 3. I remember GTA2 and Fifa 2000 running on that thing at the end of its lifecycle. Wish I still had it, its case looks very neat and clean.

Did you fix your issue with the Diagnostics disk? I had the same problem with my recently purchased Presario 4122, and I fixed it this way:

Deleted all partitions from the primary master drive.
Created a Diagnostics disk and a Setup disk (this latter one is the BIOS) on my Pentium 3 Windows 98 machine. Windows 98 reads those Softpaq packages just fine. I tried to create those disks on the Compaq itself after booting with a Windows 95 boot disk and a Dos 6 boot disk, but the disk creator always said that it could not locate command.com. It worked on my Windows 98 machine.

Then I booted the machine with the diagnostics disk. It immediately said that it could not find a Setup partition and asked if I would like to create a new one. I said yes, and after asking for both the Diagnostics disk and the Setup disk a few times, it rebooted, and now I can enter the BIOS by pressing F10.

Hey. Haven't had time to work on my project recently, I need to finish furnishing the man cave in which the Compaq will sit 😁.
But yea, basically I need to create the Softpaq floppy on a 95/98, on Win7 it doesn't work, and for some strange reason I cannot install Windows XP on my secondary PC. And I don't fancy buying another PC with 95/98.
I will ask for help in my local community, but it won't happen right now, have other priorities at the moment.
But don't worry, stay tuned and i will get to the end of this.

Ok, so I could not wait any longer and tried again with some more info i gathered in the last months.
- From what i found you DO NOT need the diagnostic setup/F10/Romflash whatever is called to install stuff on the PC. That is just an optional program that lets you diagnose components and tweak some settings. Correct me if I'm wrong;
- Apparently after inserting a bootable MS DOS floppy you just need to fdisk>>format the HDD, create a new partition and you are good to go.

And now, the problem. After inserting the MS DOS bootable floppy and receiving the error that i cannot install it because there is a problem with the HDD, i pressed F3 and typed fdisk in A in order to format the disk. Yea, the PC had other plans, i get "No Fixed Disk" error. Cables are correctly plugged in. So that's not it. CMOS battery is for sure dead after all those years. Does anybody know if you need a working battery just to install MS DOS?
The HDD is most likely working because it had Windows 98 installed and it booted before getting the " Type the name of the command interpreter" error.
So yea, might the because of the dead batter or maybe a bad jumper setup? I will try to find out if i can reset the CMOS settings on this Deskpro 4000.

Ideas are welcome.

Thanks!
Andi

I'm no expert but I'm pretty sure a working CMOS battery will be needed otherwise how does the machine remember the hard drive parameters between reboots?

Ok, so it snowballed fast in the good direction.
I tinkered some more with the IDE cables and , lo and behold, after switching the HDD from secondary IDE to primary IDE, now everything works perfectly fine. Win 98 boots ( it was already installed on the hdd i bought), Dos works, even Prince of Persia works!
I will put back the cover and just enjoy the thing as it is for some time. And in time I will dissasemble it, clean it thoroughly with IPA, and maybe format the hard and reinstall MS-DOS from scratch. But, you know what they say, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Will keep you posted!

P.S.: Funny, it let me know that the antivirus is more than 19 years old 😀)

Woody72 wrote on 2021-04-20, 13:15:

I'm no expert but I'm pretty sure a working CMOS battery will be needed otherwise how does the machine remember the hard drive parameters between reboots?

My battery works fine apparently. I don't know, we'll find out when it will get depleted 😜