Hi:
After reading the replies from Ed and Ben (thanks), it
occurred to me that I had not checked one other
area that controls the operation of floppy drives,
the CMOS! I had not seen it before in other CMOS
setup programs but this one had a write protect
selection for the floppy drive. It is now disabled and all
is well.
That write protect enable selection was probably made
a while ago at the suggestion of Dell Tech help.
Some members might benefit from the problem my friend
had with his computer...... (Dell SmartStep 1000) !000 MHz
Celeron CPU and windows XP.
The Computer worked for about a month after it was
received when it refused to boot. A message came up saying
the a problem had been detected and was probably caused
by a file called ACPI.SYS He called Dell Tech Support
(a toll call). After literally hours spent in several sessions
of long waits and fruitless instructions as to what to do to
the computer to get it back into operation, my friend gave
up and let the computer sit for about 6 months.
I finally got him to let me check it out. I found the problem
as described above. I booted the recovery discs and loaded
the C: drive to its original condition and still had the same
problem. I then put in my DOS 6.2 boot disk.
It refused to load Himem.sys because it said there was
something wrong with the expanded memory area. I then
used the win98 boot disk and it booted to a prompt with no
indication of a memory problem. The C: drive and the folders
and files were in good condition. Because the DOS boot said there was
a problem with the memory, I replaced the 128 MB memory stick.
The computer then booted to Windows XP with no problem.
When I put the original memory stick in the second slot, with the
new stick in the first slot, the original problem came back. Only
this time an other file was accused of causing the problem.
Neither the POST memory check nor the memory check for the
Himem.sys from win 98 found this problem with the memory.
You just do not know what you can depend on any more.
Wally
On Wed, 27 Nov 2002 15:46:27 -0500 [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
> I am checking a Dell SmartStep 1000 computer
> for a friend and have a problem with write protect for the
> 3.5" floppy drive. The computer has a Celeron 1000 MHz
> CPU, a CDRom drive and a hard drive with fat 32. The
> operating system is windows XP, home edition.
> At present the system is working, except that the 3.5"
> floppy drive is write protected and will not allow copying
> data or files to any disk inserted into it. The disks have
> the write protect tabs closed, so there should be no trouble
> writing to them.
> I substituted an other 3.5" floppy drive with a different
> cable, and the problem is still there. This computer has
> everything on the motherboard. Does windows XP have a
> method of setting the floppy drive to operate write protected,
> regardless of the disk tab? Should I be looking on the
> motherboard for a jumper that might be set to do this?
Wally
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