I have had Win98se installed on my comp for over 2 years, a few months ago I installed Win2k Pro, everything was working great till one day we had a power outage while the comp was turned on.

Now I can not start the comp using Win98se, I get a message about "HIMEM.SYS" missing or being corrupt. I have replaced it, it still does not work.

The BOOTLOG.TXT shows:

[000252C4] Loading Device = C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\DISPLAY.SYS
[000252C4] LoadSuccess = C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\DISPLAY.SYS
[000252C4] Loading Device = 0\HIMEM.SYS
[000252C4] LoadFailed = 0\HIMEM.SYS
[000252C4] Loading Device = 0\DBLBUFF.SYS
[000252C5] LoadFailed = 0\DBLBUFF.SYS
[000252C4] Loading Device = 0\IFSHLP.SYS
[000252C4] LoadFailed = 0\IFSHLP.SYS
[000252C6] C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\MODE.COM[000252D7] starting
[000252DA] C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\MODE.COM[000252D7] starting


The BOOT.INI shows:

[Boot Loader]
timeout=10
Default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT

[Operating Systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional" /fastdetect
C:\="Microsoft Windows 98"
C:\CMDCONS\BOOTSECT.DAT="Microsoft Windows 2000 Recovery Console" /cmdcons



Can any1 help?
What more info do I need to add hereif any.

Thanks
Mike Grace

From my experience, in Win9x environments, the himem.sys error generally means one of two things:

1. Corrupted operating system
2. Bad RAM

Since you have replaced the himem.sys file already, I am going to skip #1. Can you boot into 2k? I am assuming that you're dual booting between the two os's. If you can boot normally into 2k, I'd download SiSoft Sandra and benchmark your ram overnight. If the ram tests fine, you may have to reinstall 98.

When you replaced the himem.sys, did you replace all instances of it? Himem.sys should be located in the following places:

C:\
C:\WINDOWS

Also, check the config.sys for the proper line, as listed below:

DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\HIMEM.SYS

Also, for further verification of your himem.sys file, the exact file size is:

33,191 Bytes

Good luck, and if I think of anything else, I'll let you know.

run scan disk or chkdsk on the partition that you have 98 on

fat32 is prone to corruption