On Friday 24 September 2004 12:48, Peter Jay Salzman wrote: > On Fri 24 Sep 04, 12:21 PM, Mark K. Kim <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: > > On Fri, 24 Sep 2004, Rick Moen wrote: > > > That is correct. SYS.COM copies several files (io.sys, command.com, > > > msdos.sys, and at least one other that I've mercifully forgotten about) > > > with the read-only, hidden, and system flags set, to the indicated FAT > > > filesystem. One of those gets written to a specific physical location > > > so as to be findable by the Int13h boot service, early in the boot > > > process > > > > [snip] > > > > Starting at some DOS version, the physical location thing became no > > longer necessary. I'm not sure which version but somewhere around DOS > > 4-ish. Apparently the DOS bootstrap code became smarter and figured out > > ways to search for those files in the FS. As a consequence, the "system" > > flag on those system files (which tells the OS and utility tools like > > Norton and PC Tools not to move those files from their physical location) > > no longer became necessary as they were before. > > > > To re-install the MBR, another important component for booting DOS and > > Windows, uses FDISK's *undocumented* flag: > > > > FDISK /MBR > > > > Once I told someone to do that over the phone and he freaked out (because > > "FDISK is dangerous!") I'm not sure if he had the guts to go through > > with it... > > > > -Mark > > > >From Rick's earlier posts, it sounds like all the nameless MS 0th order > > bootloader does is pass control to the zeroth sector of the bootable > partition. > > Does that mean that XP has the same MBR as Win95? > > What I'm getting at is, can I use an old DOS fdisk to rewrite a MBR on a > Win XP machine?
As I recall, all fdisk /mbr does is takes a copy of master boot record from some backup location and places it in the master boot record of the drive. I think this is why fdisk /mbr won't remove lilo very easily(as lilo installs itself into the mbr as well as the backup location) or maybe I'm clueless, but when my mind saw "fdisk /mbr" it came up with that. -- [EMAIL PROTECTED] Mike Wenk _______________________________________________ vox-tech mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.lugod.org/mailman/listinfo/vox-tech
