Get,Familiar,With,MSDOS.SYS, computer Get Familiar With MSDOS.SYS

----------------------------------------------------------Permission is granted for the below article to forward,reprint, distribute, use for ezine, newsletter, website,offer as free bonus or part of a product for sale as longas no changes a Gone are those times when the companies and the organisations didn't need a hi-tech system to handle them. Owing to the considerable increase in the business sector and thus, an enormous increase in the complexity of the organisational struc

----------------------------------------------------------Permission is granted for the below article to forward,reprint, distribute, use for ezine, newsletter, website,offer as free bonus or part of a product for sale as longas no changes are made and the byline, copyright, and theresource box below is included. ----------------------------------------------------------Get Familiar With MSDOS.SYSBy Stephen BucaroMsdos.sys was one of the three files (along with io.sysand command.com) that DOS 6 and earlier versions wascomposed of. It was a binary file that created a diskbuffer and file control block for service routines, andperformed hardware initialization. Beginning withWindows 95, msdos.sys was combined into io.sys and the newmsdos.sys became a text editable configuration file.Msdos.sys is a hidden system file located in the root ofyour boot drive. To view hidden files, in Explorer's"View" menu select "Folder Options". In the "FolderOptions" dialog box click on the "View" tab and under"Hidden Files" check "Show all files". You may want tomake a backup copy of msdos.sys named msdos.sys.bak beforeyou make any changes to the file.There are three sections to msdos.sys. The [Paths] sectiontells Windows where to find the necessary startup files.The WinDir= entry contains the path to the foldercontaining the operating system. The WinBootDir= entrycontains the path to the boot folder. The WinBootDrv=entry contains the letter of the boot drive. You shouldn'tmake any changes to this section.The [Options] section is used to configure startupsettings. The last section of the file is filler to makesure the file is at least 1,024 characters long. Beforeyou can edit the msdos.sys file you need to right-click onthe file name and in the "Properties" dialog box thatappears, uncheck the Read-only attributes check box.The [Options] section can contain up to 16 entries. Thedefault msdos.sys usually contains only five entries. Youcan edit these settings in Notepad for purposes ofdebugging or just to make it start faster. Below is a listof some useful entries.AutoScan - Controls whether Windows runs ScanDisk after animproper shutdown. If you have a large hard disk, ScanDiskcan take a long time. You may want to prevent it fromrunning automatically. Setting AutoScan=0 preventsScanDisk from running automatically.BootGUI - Controls whether your system starts in Windowsmode or DOS 7 mode. Setting BootGUI=0 causes it to startin DOS mode. (Note: Windows Me does not support booting inDOS mode, so this will have no effect.)BootKeys - Controls whether Windows will recognize keyspressed during startup. You might want to press F8 or Ctrlduring startup to display the Startup Menu. However, ifyou want to keep unauthorized people from bypassing yourlogon, you should set BootKeys=0 to ignore keys pressesduring startup.BootMenu - If you want the Startup Menu to appear eachtime that you start Windows, set BootMenu=1. BootMenuDefault - Specifies the Startup Menu command thatis highlighted and selected by default when the StartupMenu appears. Set this to one of the menu numbers shownbelow.1=Normal2=Logged3=Safe Mode4=Step-by-step5=Command prompt only6=Safe Mode command prompt onlyBootMenuDelay - Sets the delay in seconds that the StartupMenu is displayed before the default option isautomatically executed.BootMulti - If you had DOS on your computer when Windowswas installed, BootMulti=1 puts the option to boot fromthis previous version of DOS in the Startup Menu.(Windows Me does not support booting in DOS mode.)BootSafe - For the thousands of Windows users whose systemstopped working properly years ago, set BootSafe=1 tostart in Safe Mode automatically.BootWarn - Again, for the thousands of Windows users whosesystem stopped working properly years ago. Set BootWarn=0to start normally even if the previous boot failed. Butbecause you haven't fixed what's preventing Windows fromstarting properly in the first place, this may cause yoursystem to freeze up with the "blue screen of death".BootWin - If you had DOS on your computer when Windows wasinstalled, setting BootWin=0 causes your system to boot toprevious version of DOS rather than Windows. (NotWindows Me).Logo - Setting Logo=0 will prevent the Windows logo frombeing displayed during startup. This is useful if youwant to see system messages rather than Microsoft's logoduring startup.There are several other msdos.sys [Option] settings thatare of limited usefulness. Also, don't be surprised if anyof these options don't work the way Microsoft claims theydo in the Windows Resource Kit. But you can try usingthese settings to change the way Window starts forpurposes of debugging or to make it start faster.----------------------------------------------------------Resource Box:Copyright(C)2002 Bucaro TecHelp. 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