TheStrayChow wrote on 2024-12-01, 22:23:

Hi guys, […]
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Hi guys,

I've just fired up an old pentium from around 1997 and the main OS partition has Dos 6.22 and windows 3.11 (Workgroups) installed.

On first boot, the machine would boot to DOS 6.22 ok and then if i were to manually try and boot into windows 3.11, it would freeze indefinitely at the splash screen.
After running a scandisk on the drive, it seems there were a few damaged sectors and the DOS folder became corrupt.
Now when i boot it drops to c:\ prompt grumbling that command.com can't be found.
This machine has a load of windows 3.11 utilities, out of print old bespoke applications and drivers and connectivity for old hardware (vinyl cutters, plotters and such) with finnicky configurations. What steps can i take to re-instate DOS 6.22? When browsing this disk from another windows installation i can see all the files are now free of corruption and nearly everything 'except' the dos folder still exists.

Cant i try and recreate the old DOS folder and copy the DOS files back to the DOS folder and hope that the original config.sys/autoexec.bat still point to the same locations and files and hope for the best? or will i need to re-run the DOS setup.exe to inflate the compressed files first? I havnt installed DOS for about 20 years... so is it a destructive process where it will attempt to fdisk the c: drive as per the installation?

Any helps, (steps!) would be greatly appreciated. I have the DOS 6.22 files burnt onto a floppy-emulated CD but have no floppy disks to use to aid the process.... any advice would be amazing.

i pretty much have zero experience with pure dos as i only installed it recently for the first time, but restoring installs i mess up i do all the time usually with win98

if the drive is important dont mess with it, what i'd do is get another harddrive and use aomei partition assistant to clone the drive block for block, thought this might not work if files are corrupt or missing as you might just have the same error,

or get another drive and setup dos6.22/3.11 on it then copy all the extra files from the hdd you want to save across to the new drive except the main system files, make sure to select show hidden files and folders in your folder options before copying files so you get everything thats not on the drive you just did a fresh install on, also make sure to copy any autoexec.bat and config.sys over as well. though if its just command.com its having problems with you could just try copy that and hope it works

i do this all the time with win98 when i mess up my install, should work for dos/3.1.

Yeah copying is fine.
No registry back then.

Yes you can simply replace command.com (or any other corrupt files) from a boot floppy or wherever.
As long as you can get to c:\ your ok, everything else at least for dos are just basic files common to any install of 6.22
(excluding your specific entries in config.sys and autoexec.bat)

@myne
@chinny22

Thanks guys. Life-savers! Yeah i thought as much, but didn't want to 100% trust my 20 year old knowledge off the nuances of it, then end up down shits creek... 😀

Yeah no worries 😀 maybe i should have gone with an 8 word vague reply. why do i bother.🤣

@DudeFace - Apologies!! I didnt actually see your response! My bad... I wouldn't have left you out knowingly after taking the time. I've got around 40 tabs open and scrolled straight to the end 🤣. Sorry mate.

🤣 no worries mate, hope u got it sorted 😀

@Dudeface - Thanks for taking the time, for the mean time i've copied the DOS folder back to C: (as it's quick to check) as i have a windows 95 install on another disk to manipulate it further...

chinny22 wrote on 2024-12-01, 23:32:

Yes you can simply replace command.com (or any other corrupt files) from a boot floppy or wherever.

The correct way would be to call sys c: when booted from a floppy (that includes the sys.com file).

thanks @Azarien