Are there more partitions on that disk?
Does that disk have an ACTIVE partition? (You can verify and change that in fdisk)

MustiFB82 wrote on 2025-11-18, 09:58:

Try this.

boot from floppy & remove all partitions.
Reboot
boot from floppy, & create your primary partition
Reboot
boot from floppy & format your primary partition using format C: /S
Reboot
Does it boot from hdd ?

weedeewee wrote on 2025-11-18, 17:03:

Try this. […]
Show full quote

MustiFB82 wrote on 2025-11-18, 09:58:

Try this.

boot from floppy & remove all partitions.
Reboot
boot from floppy, & create your primary partition
Reboot
boot from floppy & format your primary partition using format C: /S
Reboot
Does it boot from hdd ?

I did all of them above..

I formatted HDD first at 6Gb then re-formatted it at 2 Gb then I reformatted,deleted all partitions and reduced it to 1GB(1027 MB).

I tried "format C: /S" again and again. Last time my DOS 6.22 installed without any problem after I changed 2nd disc. Three of them are working and one bootdisc,all from [edit by Dominus: please do not post links to warezsites]. I will try to install Win95 OR2.5 tomorrow to 5 GB part but I have doubt if HDD can work both at FAT16 and FAT32 type.

I will inform you tomorrow. I hope during Windows 95 installation I will not have problem with recognition of CD ROM drive despite it is showed at BIOS and starting process.

I have solved the problems with Windows 95 however after I installed IE4.0 other problems emerged.

For unable to install MS-DOS ,I assume the real problem is HDD,because it is 6 GB. If it was under or equal to 2 GB,DOS will not face of those because I installed W95 OR2 and it worked perfectly.

Still I try to figure out how to activate USB ports,despite I install driver support for USD and my mainboard has ports for it,it does not see USB disks,even older USB 1.0,I do not know why.

Another problem is when I install drivers and windows CD-ROM driver works perfectly but when I try install software it stops at middle or start of process. Due to that I zipped and installed IE4.0 from HDD(second hdd volume) but I could not copy Office 95 files. I used CD-RW discs but I am not sure if they cause problem.

At beginning of Win95 start I see again missing files warnings,multiple times most related to Fax-Modem and internet drivers. But Windows 95 can still begin normally.

I am also dissapointed from screen,monitor or graphic card does not show sufficent brightness as I expected. I will try to install monitor drivers because I tried S3 drivers and now they work without problem.

Finally when I select shut down computer with ALT+F4 the screen comes as wait for shutting down but it does not say now you can shut down you computer. I assume this is due to sound from power supply of ATX-case.

I will send photos asap when I finish my work at office.

I think your drive geometry causes problems.
You have 13328 cylinders (!), 15 heads and 63 sectors via LBA method.
That's not okay. Classic DOS has 1024 cylinder limit (counting from 0 to 1023).
Normally, in LBA mode, the sectors should go up instead (up to 255 or so) and leave the cylinders on a low number.

Also, there's another "problem". MS-DOS 7.x uses BIOS to get drive geometry, Windows 9x uses its HDD driver to get it.
So if BIOS and HDD report different values, the DOS and Windows personality of Windows 95 get confused about everything.

As a solution, I think, it's best to change BIOS settings to have "NORMAL" or "LARGE" setting.
Either of which report a small cylinder number, not sure.
Note: That requires a re-install, backup your data first.

Or, as a workaround, set the BIOS to NORMAL and use a dynamic drive overlay (DDO).
The latest ones will have a Windows 95/98 driver included.
Phils Computerlab has all the stuff, I think.
That way, both DOS and Windows will see same thing.

Speaking under correction, though.

Good luck! 🙂🤞

FWIW, you can drop a step by using: FORMAT/S C:
This automatically does the equivalent of "SYS C:" after the format.
- It shouldn't be any different from FORMAT & then SYS, but I have encountered cases over the years where SYS wouldn't always work.

Also, you mentioned "5gb partion" ....

Early editions of DOS couldn't work with partitions over a certain size - later versions could work with larger drives, but I don't recall if it became "unlimited" or what the upper boundary actually was.

Also, if restoring a vintage machine, older BIOS also couldn't deal with big drives - I don't recall exactly, but I *think* it might have been 2G.
(yeah, I still have 3 pure-DOS machines, but all of them have <=500g drives)

If you have a smaller drive available, give it a try ... unavailability of "new" small drives is one of the reasons you sometime see people setting up DOS systems with a CF card for the hard drive.

I second this! ^^

The "long way" would be to do FORMAT C: /B and then SYS C:

The /B parameter often is being forgotten, but it's important for a clean installation.
Because, it reserves space for the system files so they will safely fit.
Without /B it may or may not be possible to do a SYS to a drive.

Another tip or fun fact: MS-DOS doesn't require a partition to work.
It can also run from a so-called "super floppy", which uses same principle as a big floppy disk.
People who boot MS-DOS from an LS-120 or ZIP drive are often in super floppy mode.

After installing Win95 OR2.1 my vintage deskop works perfectly. Still I could not install Office 95, always gives error during installation.

Anyway other software and utilities works flawless.