Yes it happened to me and I'm trying to recall when..
Is it by any chance installed on a FAT32 or is running from a Win95+MSDOS setup?

Have you messed around with mono graphics or copied this windows install from another machine?

It may be that it is returning to the wrong DOS text mode. In that it is returning to a DOS prompt, just not on the hardware you are looking at. Give it a bit until all disk activity seems to have stopped, then type
mode co80
blind at the prompt, press return and see if you get back.
Also if the windows install didn't come off generic disks check you haven't got a win.bat file in your path running win then putting a mode mono in after so it is trying to return to mono.

wbahnassi wrote on Yesterday, 17:30:

Yes it happened to me and I'm trying to recall when..
Is it by any chance installed on a FAT32 or is running from a Win95+MSDOS setup?

No, it was a (supposedly) fresh msdos install with Fat16 (albeit, from many years ago)

BUT I see that FDisk /status is reporting back

1Disk    Drv    MBytes    Free    Usage
21              16         0      100%
3        C:     503                                  

and FDISK > selection 4 shows:

1Partition    Status    Type           Volume    Label    MBytes    System    Usage
2C:1           A       PRI DOS         DOS                503       FAT16     100%
3
4Total Disk Space is 16 MBytes

That seems odd.

Rolo_Ranger wrote on Yesterday, 19:39:

No, it was a (supposedly) fresh msdos install with Fat16 (albeit, from many years ago) […]
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wbahnassi wrote on Yesterday, 17:30:

Yes it happened to me and I'm trying to recall when..
Is it by any chance installed on a FAT32 or is running from a Win95+MSDOS setup?

No, it was a (supposedly) fresh msdos install with Fat16 (albeit, from many years ago)

BUT I see that FDisk /status is reporting back

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1Disk    Drv    MBytes    Free    Usage
21              16         0      100%
3        C:     503                                  

and FDISK > selection 4 shows:

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1Partition    Status    Type           Volume    Label    MBytes    System    Usage
2C:1           A       PRI DOS         DOS                503       FAT16     100%
3
4Total Disk Space is 16 MBytes

That seems odd.

Seems something got screwed in the original install if it's only showing 16MB of total disk space.
I reckon a fresh start is probably best bet?

Possibly could happen like that if you partitioned with old version of DOS and did a format /s from newer MSDOS... orrr something. talking about the FAT12 FAT16 thing.

Paste Autoexec.
Path?
Comspec?

I believe the issue stems back to my BIOS. I figured out why DOS FDISK was only reporting 16mb. My hard drive had like 1057 cylinders, MSDOS6.22 only understands up to 1024. My motherboard is pretty old for a 486 and does not appear to support LBA.

Wish I discovered this issue before i wiped everything! But I believe this was the root cause. I backed everything important up anyways.

Rolo_Ranger wrote on Today, 18:33:

I believe the issue stems back to my BIOS. I figured out why DOS FDISK was only reporting 16mb. My hard drive had like 1057 cylinders, MSDOS6.22 only understands up to 1024. My motherboard is pretty old for a 486 and does not appear to support LBA.

Wish I discovered this issue before i wiped everything! But I believe this was the root cause. I backed everything important up anyways.

1024 cylinders go from 0 to 1023
16 heads go from 0 to 15
63 sectors go from 1 to 63

It depends on the CMOS Setup, however, how the values are interpreted.
Maybe entering 1024 cylinders (total) or 1023 (0 to 1023) is the right thing to do. Same goes for heads (15 or 16).
To be on the safe side, better check the calculated storage capacity.
Entering 1020 cylinders, 16 heads, 63 should also work.