Hi all,

system:-- compaq presario 5000 about 6 years old. windows 98 se

event prior to problem.:---last night after a session of webcam chat with a friend shut down the system. all the desktop icons went and on the bare wallpaper a window popped up.... " warning! windows did not detect a mouse attached to your system. if you have serial mouse attach now...if ps2 you will have to shut down before attaching. AND THE SYSTEM JUST FROZE AT THIS STAGE.

thinking it might be one of those quirks , powered down, rebooted.

compaq splash screen/ avg boot sector scan/ ms windows 98 splash screen/refresh/again splash screen/ blinking cursor on right hand corner/ desktop wall paper with the same msg. and freeze. powered off.

today reinserted the ps2 mouse cable and booted up. exactly the SAME sequence of events and freeze!!

powered down and tried bios (f10.) bios screen opened up but SYSTEM WILL NOT TAKE ANY KEYBOARD INPUT!!!! so just could not get into any of the bios menu.
actually it was not any sort of normal bios but a " compaq set up utility" as it stated on the screen with very limited features.

next step got a USB TO PS2 adapter and plugged in the keyboard and mouse/ booted up/ entered bios. this time keyboard input was functional and saw "USB LEGACY KEYBOARD".. ENABLED. saved and exited but alas again the very same sequence of events and freezing.

next inserted a win 98 se boot floppy and tried scan disk. results ok.

again ctl/alt/del and inserted win 98 se CD in the cd drive.

tried F:SETUP. setup screen appeared BUT NO MOUSE INPUT ACCEPTED FOR CLICKING " CONTINUE"!!!!. MOUSE JUST FROZE.

though i could have continued with setup by input from keyboard i did not because ....WHAT IF AFTER SETUP I FIND MYSELF IN THE SAME SITUATION WITH THE SYSTEM FREEZING??

SO EXITED SETUP WITH KEYBOARD INPUT AND HERE I AM POSTING FROM ANOTHER SYSTEM FOR HELP.

have compaq recovery cd but reluctant to try because it will format/reinstall factory settings BUT WHAT GUARANTEE it is not a hardware problem and same result will not happen.

will a serial port mouse help... have not seen one to be honest...

TIA for the patience to read the long post and any input-----Venkat

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