Found Computer, Need Help

[Redih]

Recently, my friend got a 100mhz pentium from somewhere (Dumpster across the street), and he decided to bring it to me, because even old computers need loving. First, I try to boot it up, and I've found out that their windows is all messed up (I have no idea), I thought about just formatting the whole thing and setting up a little linux server, but I think I'll be missing out on a great learning experience. So heres, what I know:

1. The OS would be win95 (if it worked) and when I put in my disk to boot it to dos, dos runs, but can only access A (and B, but says same thing as A) I can't get to C:, as says invalid drive, so does the rest c-z.

2. The linux installation works.

3. No hardware problems.

4. I'd like to see what was on it before I install linux.

I know this is a windows question, but I figured I would ask in this forum because from what I've found out -- Linux users are generally more intelligent than any Windows user -- So if anybody knows what my next step would be, or help me figure out what information to search for on google, it would be greatly appreciated. I just want to see what's on it before I format it and throw linux on. I might be thinking he just formatted it completely then threw it out, but I doubt it.

[dkeav]

doubt that machine will boot a cd, so make a boot floppy for a livecd or use a live floppies like tomsrootboot and mount the partition from that environment, or use knoppix with a boot floppy and be sure to boot with knoppix 2 (console only)

[Redih]

Yea, that's what I was thinking, but I'll have to learn more about mounting(aka this is the time to learn). Would MandrakeMover work, I'm not on broadband, so I can't exactly download Knoppix, but I do have a MandrakeMover cd. Would I be able to mount the windows partition from MandrakeMover? Remember, it's 100mhz comp, so the gui probly won't work to well, and it's gonna be slow.

What I'm trying to do is see if I can recover the files, just to see if I can do it.

[dkeav]

www.toms.net/rb

there ya go, read man mount on how to mount the drive, basically just make a mount point and mount it with
mount -t vfat /dev/<devicename> /some/mount/point

[shadov]

Anything with cfdisk/fdisk and ability to mount Windows FAT partitions should work. MandrakeMover almost certainly has these tools.

I would do it this way:
1. cfdisk /dev/hda to see partition layout
2. try to mount anything that is in there

Or you could put the hd into a working Windows box and see if it can figure it out..

[Redih]

Awesome, thanks a lot, this might be fun.

[EnigmaOne]

Originally posted by Redih
Linux users are generally more intelligent than any Windows user

Yeah. The additional indignity of the situation is that the average Linux user is more intelligent than the 'professional' coders in Redmond--but we try not to gloat about it in front of the poor, little darlings. ;)

B: is simply a phantom entry for A:
Verify the hardware first.

You might have to run through the CMOS configuration screens and spruce-up the hard drive parameters (C/H/S etc.). It might need a new CMOS backup battery. Hopefully you don't have a DallasTime module in the machine--they were irritatingly 'popular' (though certainly not with me) on motherboards of that vintage.
If you can get access to the windoze partition, you may have an '\olddos\' sub-directory available to you. You can--if it's there--find the system maintenance utilities there (append, fdisk, format, join, etc), or in the \windows\command\ sub-dir.

If you find the native fdisk app, try 'fdisk /mbr' as a first measure; then run fdisk to see if it can even see the partition table entries.

Better yet, if you have a DR-DOS 7.03 boot/utilities disk, you can handle pretty much any partition work you need to do. DR7.03 may still be available for download from some places, as it was being distributed by Caldera for free for a while; but that's an issue that needs to be addressed with DeviceLogics, Inc. now.

I'm not overly proud, and regularly drag computers out of trash bins and alleys--or have then 'gifted' to me--and resurrect the things, or scavenge parts off of them, to be given to folks who live in our very poor urban neighborhood or to some of the K-3 classrooms.
Despite that, I still need to finally face the fact that I have to clean out the garage this summer--I hate throwing functional hardware out--because I can't get the car in there anymore!

Anyways....
On such machines, drive cables are usually loose or outright bad. CMOS backup batteries are also usually drained flat, and the hard drives in discarded boxes--if not already bad from being dropped--don't last long.
Expect to replace a few things, and count it as 'icing on the cake' if you don't have to.

[Gertrude]

What I'm trying to do is see if I can recover the files, just to see if I can do it.


I would just take the HDD out of the computer, and stick it in another one. Then mount the drive from there.