Ed,

You are seeing "feedback" from the commands that are being issued by
either the CONFIG.SYS or AUTOEXEC.BAT files.  The statement BAD COMMAND or
FILE NAME simply means that there is a statement (in one of the two files
mentioned above) that can not be executed.

You can find out what the statement is by doing a step-by-step boot.
1. Turn on the PC.
2. LIGHTLY place a finger on the F8 function key.
3. IMMEDIATELY press the F8 key when you see the
     STARTING MSDOS message.  ( there is only a 2-3
     time period when this key is active so stay alert)
4. Now type the number for the option to boot with
    step by step confirmation. (sorry I don't remember the number)
5. Press Y for each step/question.
6. When you see the message BAD COMMAND OR FILE NAME
    it will be referring to the command you saw immediately before
    the error message.

Now you will know where your problem is.
I am guessing it has something to do with your sound card.

If you need more assistance from us, then please provide more details
about your system.
CPU type, total RAM, O/S, etc........

Jim Meagher
=====
Micro Solutions Consulting        Member of The HTML Writers Guild
http://www.ezy.net/~microsol     International Webmasters Association
410-543-8996                MS Site Builder Network - Level 2 member
=====
----- Original Message -----
From: Ed Nelson
> Here's the screen I get on cold boot, having tried to get my system
> back into functioning order after the hard drive's death:
>

         The PCSOFT web site always needs good submissions.  If
          you would like to contribute to the website, send any
               software tech tips or software reviews to:
                           [log in to unmask]