Let's get formatting!
Now you're ready to format. You should have a bootable floppy with CD-ROM support and major system utilities on it, such as a Windows 98 boot disk. Boot to the floppy and use it to format the hard drive where Windows will reside, which is usually the C drive. After the drive has been formatted, use the md and cd commands to create the directory C:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\CABS. Afterwards, copy the contents of your CD's Win9x directory to it. You can do this by typing the following at DOS prompt:
copy x:\win9X\*.* c:\windows\options\cabs
Please note that x:\ represents the drive letter of your CD-ROM, and the Windows directory on the CD may be different from what we have listed here.
So why do you need to copy the CD contents to your hard drive? There are several reasons for doing this, rather than running Windows Setup directly from the CD:
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C:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\CABS is the "professional, industry standard" hard drive repository for Windows installation files. If you put them somewhere else, another tech may have difficulty finding them or may wonder if the CABs in C:\WINCABS are the correct ones.
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Hard drives are faster than CD-ROMs, so your Windows installation will be faster.
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When Windows reboots during Setup, it won't be looking for a CD-ROM.
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Windows will set the registry SourcePath to "C:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\CABS" and know where to look for its system files from now on.
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When later installing device drivers, you won't be bombarded with "Please insert your Windows CD" messages.
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You'll be glad you did when the user "misplaces" the Windows CD.
| Please note the following |
| When you run Setup for the first time, you may be prompted to install Windows into a "C:\WINDOWS.000" directory. Change this to "C:\WINDOWS" and ignore the caution messages, as the directory is empty and there is no risk of overwriting anything.
|
MSBATCH.INF for custom configurations
One more thing you should consider before running Setup will be whether you'll be loading this version of Windows to several PCs. If so, or if there are a great number of system settings that will need to be configured, consider learning how to use BATCH.EXE. You can find the installation files on the Windows CD.
This program has nothing to do with batch files. BATCH.EXE will let you create a file called msbatch.inf from an existing PC containing all your custom configurations for product keys, workgroup names, network settings, printer defaults, and more. You can even streamline your Windows installation by adding msbatch.inf instructions to bypass the End User License Agreement screen and to reboot during setup without user intervention. Copy the file to C:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\CABS, and Windows will find it and use it automatically during Setup, configuring Windows to your specifications.
This is only the beginning
Now that you've gathered all the important information, reformatted the drive, created the CABS directory, and copied the Win9x files to it, go ahead and type SETUP at the command prompt. DO NOT PRESS ENTER YET! There's a lot more you can do before and after that keystroke, but that's another story.
John Kowaleski is the Webmaster of TechSetGO!, The Fast Lane For Techs and a desktop/laptop PC support specialist. He is an A+ certified technician, a CompTIA member, and has many product certifications from such manufacturers as Compaq, Dell, HP, and Lexmark. John also holds Windows 9x Administrator and Master Windows 9x Power User certifications from Brainbench.com.
