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Bootable USB thumb drive (Read 7397 times)

clanky

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Bootable USB thumb drive
Dec 11^th, 2009 at 5:41am

I've created a boot usb thumb drive which works fine on 2 pc's.

On a 3rd pc the drive starts to boot & hangs at 'Loading Windows 98'

I had to use the following Config.sys setup

device=himem.sys
dos=high,umb

otherwise ghost was too big to load into memory.

What changes do I have to make for it to load on the 3rd pc (nforce3-A, 1G ram, Athlon64)

Al

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Re: Bootable USB thumb drive
Reply #1 - Dec 11^th, 2009 at 1:17pm

clanky

Quote:

On a 3rd pc the drive starts to boot & hangs at 'Loading Windows 98'

Without an error message, it's hard to know what's going wrong!

But, *Loading Windows 98* would indicate you are using MS-DOS boot files--you could try pressing the F8 key as soon as that message shows--you should get a screen that allows you to select *Step-by-step Confirmation* for loading each of the command lines in your *config.sys* and *autoexec.bat* boot files. You will probably get an option to save a *log file*, but I say *No* to that first line.

What command line does the boot process freeze at?

Quote:

I had to use the following Config.sys setup

device=himem.sys
dos=high,umb

otherwise ghost was too big to load into memory.

Curious! Ghost is only about a 1 MB program. I have loaded on a system with only 32 MB of system RAM. I have never seen it max out the available DOS memory for running a DOS program. I wonder what's unusual about your system that requires that?!

What other *device=* load commands are being executed in *config.sys* and *load* or *loadhigh* commands are being used in *autoexec.bat* such that too much of the DOS memory is being used up?

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clanky

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Re: Bootable USB thumb drive
Reply #2 - Dec 12^th, 2009 at 2:14am

If I remove the config.sys file it works ok on 2 machines.
Without a config.sys the problem pc boots into dos ok & it will run Ghost 2003 ok. It will not run Ghost 8.2 or Ghost 11, it says 'Program too big to fit in memory'.

With the config.sys file the bios shows the devices followed by ACPI controller. It then says 'Verifying Pool Data'. This is followed by 'Starting Windows 98 ...' & thats as far as it gets. This is on a ECS Nforce3 board with 1gig ram & Athlon64 cpu.

I only have 2 lines in Autoexec.bat - ctmouse.exe & doskey -i.

Al

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clanky

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Re: Bootable USB thumb drive
Reply #3 - Dec 12^th, 2009 at 7:43am

OK, I think there must be something odd if not faulty with this mother board.

I pressed F8 to step the boot sequence & found that device=himem.sys was causing it to hang. (there's no error message - it appears that its froze & won't proceed any further)

Booting without a config.sys and autoexec.bat works but if I try running Ghost 2003 or higher I get the 'Program too big to fit in memory' message.

I ram mem.exe & got the folowing

Total memory=66,110k
Under 1MB=638k
Used=87k
Free=51k
Extended (XMS)=65,472k
Used=65,472k

I've reset the bios, tried setting it to optimized efaults, (I haven't got a failsafe option).

I ran memtest & found no errors.

Al

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Re: Bootable USB thumb drive
Reply #4 - Dec 13^th, 2009 at 10:17am

clanky

The added details are helpful--interesting results!

Quote:

This is on a ECS Nforce3 board with 1gig ram & Athlon64 cpu

I did a search--looks like that description may be too general to pull up a specific board--here's one: Part #: NFORCE3-A-R
Looks like the chipset supports both PATA and SATA devices.

Sometimes, SATA controllers have *optimized* settings that apparently improve performance for a Windows based OS--probably using NTFS file system--and DOS will not work properly.

Look in the BIOS under sections that have to do with the SATA controller--is there anywhere where it talks about changing the SATA *mode*--it's been discussed elsewhere that that setting needs to be something like *Combined* or *Compatible* or *Compatibility Mode* or something similar--in order to allow booting to and using DOS based programs.

Once done with the DOS program, switch the setting back to it's *native* SATA mode.

Did this help?

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clanky

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	Re: Bootable USB thumb drive Reply #5 - Dec 13^th, 2009 at 10:42am This board is really an ide board with two sata sockets. All the drives are ide. I tried turning off sata in the bios & changing the usb settings to1.1 but no difference. It works perfectly with a boot cd so I guess its something to do with the way they've implemented the bios.
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Re: Bootable USB thumb drive
Reply #6 - Dec 13^th, 2009 at 10:52am

clanky

Thanks for the feedback.

Quote:

I tried turning off sata in the bios & changing the usb settings to1.1 but no difference.

So, no option to change the SATA *mode*?

Quote:

It works perfectly with a boot cd so I guess its something to do with the way they've implemented the bios.

I would have to agree. Sometimes we just have to go with *what works*!

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clanky

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	Re: Bootable USB thumb drive Reply #7 - Dec 13^th, 2009 at 2:58pm NightOwl wrote on Dec 13^th, 2009 at 10:52am: So, no option to change the SATA mode? No, the only option is 'Serial-ATA 2(Internal PHY)' enable/disable Al
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