Is there a way to make Windows 95 include the CD-ROM drivers on the Startup Disk?

A couple of weeks ago, a friend of mine called me on Sunday night, frantic because her system had crashed so badly she decided she needed to reinstall Windows 95. She booted her machine with the Windows 95 Startup Disk, but discovered that she couldn't access her CD-ROM drive. Of course, she needed her CD-ROM drive to reinstall Windows 95, so it was very frustrating for her.

It was frustrating for me because it sounded like something I should have known. Happily, when I got to the office, I found the answer to this question in the archives of ZD Journals' Inside Microsoft Windows 95. Unfortunately, there isn't a way to make Windows 95 include the CD-ROM drivers on the Startup Disk. However, you can add the drivers to the disk manually.

Fortunately, both your CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files still contain the commands necessary to load the CD-ROM drivers. Therefore, the easiest way to perform this task is to copy your existing CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files, as well as the CD-ROM drivers, to the Windows 95 Startup Disk. Then, you edit the CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files so that they load the drivers from the Windows 95 Startup Disk.

However, this technique has a small drawback. If you ever recreate the Windows 95 Startup Disk from the Add/Remove Programs Properties sheet, you'll have to remember to re-create the CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files, as the Startup Disk creation procedure completely erases the disk before copying files to it.

To add the drivers to the disk, first insert your Windows 95 Startup Disk in drive A and copy your CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files from the root directory on drive C to the Windows 95 Startup Disk. Now, launch Notepad or WordPad and open the new CONFIG.SYS file, noting the location of your CD-ROM drivers. Then, launch My Computer or Windows Explorer and locate and copy the drivers to the Windows 95 Startup Disk.

For example, suppose your CONFIG.SYS looks like the one shown here:

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DEVICE=C:\WIN95\HIMEM.SYS

DOS=HIGH

LASTDRIVE=Z

DEVICE=C:\UTILS\ASPI2DOS.SYS /D /Z

DEVICE=C:\UTILS\ASPICD.SYS /D:ASPICD0

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The CONFIG.SYS file contains the commands to load your CD-ROM drivers.

Then you'd copy the CD-ROM driver files ASPI2DOS.SYS and ASPICD.SYS from the UTILS folder on your hard disk to the Windows 95 Startup Disk.

At this point, you need to edit your CONFIG.SYS file so that it loads only the CD-ROM drivers from the Windows 95 Startup Disk. To do so, remove all other commands except the ones that load the ASPI2DOS.SYS and ASPICD.SYS drivers. Now, edit those commands so that Windows 95 loads the driver files from the floppy disk, as shown here:

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DEVICE=ASPI2DOS.SYS /D /Z

DEVICE=ASPICD.SYS /D:ASPICD0

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You'll edit the CONFIG.SYS file so it loads the drivers from the Windows 95 Startup Disk.

Next, return to My Computer or Windows Explorer, locate your Windows 95 folder, and open the Command folder. Then, locate and copy the Microsoft CD-ROM Extension driver file MSCDEX.EXE to the Windows 95 Startup Disk.

Once you've done so, you need to edit the AUTOEXEC.BAT file you copied to the Windows 95 Startup Disk. You'll need to remove every line except the one that loads MSCDEX. You'll then edit that line so that it loads MSCDEX from the Windows 95 Startup Disk. For example, suppose your AUTOEXEC.BAT file looks like the one shown here:

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@ECHO OFF

PROMPT $P$G

SET MOUSE=C:\MOUSE

rem - By Windows Setup-C:\MOUSE\MOUSE.EXE /Q

PATH C:\WIN95;C:\WIN95\COMMAND;C:\DOS;C:\NC;C:\UTILS

SET TEMP=C:\DOS

rem - By Windows Setup-C:\WIN95\COMMAND\MSCDEX.EXE /D:ASPICD0 H:12 /L:E

rem - By Windows 95 Network-C:\WIN311\net start

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Your AUTOEXEC.BAT file loads the MSCDEX driver.

You'd need to edit it until it looks like the one shown here.

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MSCDEX.EXE /D:ASPICD0 H:12 /L:E

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You'll edit the AUTOEXEC.BAT file so that it loads the MSCDEX driver from the Windows 95 Startup Disk.

Once you've copied the drivers and modified both the CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files, you'll be able to access your CD-ROM drive when you boot with the Startup Disk. To avoid having to go through this process every time, you may want to copy the CD-ROM drivers and the modified CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files to a second floppy disk for backup purposes.

Copyright © 1997 The Cobb Group, a division of Ziff-Davis Inc.