Using Knoppix to Recover Windows 98

**raven** · 07-15-2004, 07:23 PM

Hi all, is it possible to run Knoppix 3.4 from the CD to fix a corrupt FAT32 partition?

Here's basically what happened:

I dual-booted my Windows 98 system to run 98 and SuSE 9.1, but after a lil' bit, 98 stopped booting when I selected to boot it. It'd say "Please enter the path to the command script (eg: C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND.COM)", and when I'd do that, it'd still not work.

So, now I can only run SuSE successfully. I only have a recovery CD for 98, no floppy (plus, my floppy drive is screwy).

Here's the specs that I know of for the computer:

HP Pavilion 6545C
63 Megs of usable RAM
12 Gig HD (6 Gig for 98, 7 for SuSE and the swap)

*My Windows 98 format is FAT32*

Knoppix can run on the computer, because I've done it before.

**bongski55** · 07-18-2004, 11:00 AM

I think you have to reinstall win98. Create a linux boot disk from suse first and after reinstall of win98,boot using the linux disk and run lilo(or grub).

**raven** · 07-18-2004, 04:13 PM

Originally Posted by bongski55

I think you have to reinstall win98. Create a linux boot disk from suse first and after reinstall of win98,boot using the linux disk and run lilo(or grub).

Thanks

I got it all fixed up a couple of days ago though (I've been fixing it up some).

**bongski55** · 07-21-2004, 10:32 PM

I don't think you can use one OS to repair another corrupted OS especially windows.Perhaps if you were able to do otherwise you would be kind enough to post the steps here?

**raven** · 07-23-2004, 09:56 PM

Here's what I did:

1. Delete all the partitions (they were all way to small; 400-500 megs each)
2. Create a primary dos partition
3. Restarted w/ my Windows 98 Recovery CD
4. Got to the command line
5. cd'ed til I got to c:\windows\*folder* (i forgot what the folder was called)
6. typed in: fdisk /status (to test if fdisk was there)
7. then i typed: format c (to completely reformat my c drive)
8. restarted w/ my cd in the drive still, and re-installed 98
9. got to the command line again (before windows loaded)
10. typed fdisk /mbr (i did this since my bootloading was screwed up)

and it was fixed. to find the *folder* in step 5, just cd to the main drive (c, d, or whatever), and type fdisk /status, if that doesn't work, just cd x:\windows\, then if that fails, just go through all the folders in windows. (note: x = main drive)