Windows XP forum: How can I get to DOS Command prompt???? Please help.

Which operating system is employed.

The question was how to get to the DOS prompt before Windows opens. Paul is right, this depends on the OS. In Win 9x, F8 during boot took you to an options screen where DOS was one of the options. That option no longer exists in Win XP.

The only I know to do it with XP is to have a boot floppy or CD that contains DOS.

Frank

I said that in XP the DOS option was no longer available on that screen. And that is true, at least for Win XP Pro. The option is Safe Mode with Command Prompt, which is not the same as an initial DOS prompt. If the XP Home options page says ''Safe mode to a DOS prompt,'' I question the terminology as XP does not really contain DOS -- just a partial emulation of it.

The original post asked ''How do you get into DOS prior to windows loading,'' and this was reiterated in my previous post. The key here is ''prior to Windows loading.'' The Command Prompt (or the DOS prompt in Frank Q's post) is under Windows Safe Mode; i.e., after Windows has loaded. This is not a solution to the question asked.

I fear that responders often do not read the questions carefully (and I am sometimes guilty of this myself) and post answers that are not really appropriate to the main question. This is very evident in this thread, where several posts refer to the Command Prompt option within Windows, not prior to windows.

Frank

windows XP anymore. It has a couple of other names. One is Command Prompt and the other is Recovery Console.

This is a fairly limited version of DOS but it will do most of the things you need done.

Back in the 90's, DOS would let you do anything you wanted it to do with a rare warning if you were about to do something that will crash your PC.

..before Windows launches ? Depends on the version of Window, simply because ''DOS'' disappeared from Win98 SE onwards. You get a ''Commamd Prompt''. It works like DOS, but that is not DOS. The closest you get to launch it ''before Windows launches'' is when starting Windows in Safe Mode, where you get the option for ''Safe Mode with Command Prompt'', but that is not DOS, and that actually runs in Windows (Safe Mode) !

For Windows XP, the clostest to DOS is the commamd prompt you get by typing ''command'' at run, whhere you have to type the exist commamd to return to the desktop (as in real DOS), instead of the command prompt you get by typing "cmd" at run, where you exist by Xing out, as in Windows.

I know this will sound crazy, but from your description of your sister's problem, it appears as though she was used to using Windows 3.1! And why would your sister be using her TV as a computer monitor?

Just which DOS command was your sister trying to type in? Was she using a windowed command prompt screen or a full DOS textmode screen?

As others here have already noted, the command prompt utility available in WinXP is not the same as the true DOS X.X operating system command prompt which acted as a comspec environment command interface only. The name of this command processor file was ''COMMAND.COM.'' The whole purpose of Microsoft's NT Windows Operating System is to provide the user with a true shell environment from the ground up. Windows 3.1 was a glorified user shell using a DOS dependent ''Kernel'' environment with graphical interface. The user options within a true shell environment far exceed those that are available in comspec only. WindowsXP does, however provide a true DOS-like environment for running old DOS programs. The file is called ''NTVDM.EXE(NT Virtual DOS Machine).'' ...And for programs needing valid Win 3.x system kernel interupts, ... a 16-bit provider file called ''WOWEXEC.EXE(Windows On Windows).'' Also WinXP provides a Win 3.x shell simulator using a file called ''PROGMAN.EXE.''

Another possibility regarding your sister's problem is this: She was used to using a special pre-boot feature provided by XP called ''Recovery Console.'' This feature MUST be installed manually and will result in the creation of a new disk partition with a black and white screen at boot-up time having the appearance of a ''DOS'' screen. Once installed, if ''Recovery Console'' is selected as a boot-up option from this ''multiple boot'' screen, a textmode prompt will appear that looks like a real DOS prompt. Recovery Console commands, however, only vaguely resemble those of the real DOS.

Some technicians forget to re-install this feature on computers that they've restored because most XP computers don't have it installed to begin with. It's an easy thing to overlook.

Download a free copy of Linus Ubuntu onto a CD put it in your PC at the booting time, once it asks you to install Ubuntu don't do, ESC and a Ubuntu page will open giving you access to the entire computer. Now you can delete, save, anything you want to do before reformatting your computer and loosing everything. You don't need dos nor prompt command.

He has XP on his computer. I made the Linux live disc from my laptop - Windows 7

...." something. So I tried to go into safe mode and get to the dos prompt all I got was a string of stuff. So I tried to boot from the DOS disk - same thing - "missing file". Tried to boot from the Windows boot disk - same thing. Tried to boot from D drive - same thing. Physically removed the C disk - all the same thing. I have no idea where to even turn now. It's a shame - it's a nice machine.

I have 2 CD drives on the machine and tried both. Just can't figure it out. )o:

and the CD's themselves were fresh out of the package. I tried 2 different ones thinking it might be a bad Cd. I'm stumped.

or a bad drive.

Did you try booting on another PC?
Did you set the BIOS to boot from the CD?

And how did you burn that Linux to CD? Tell the details. There's are wrong ways and good ways, and wrong programs and good programs and even wrong ways with good programs. It turns out that quite a few people don't know how to burn an image, so burn it as data. That's wrong.

Just a few days ago I downloaded Ubuntu and burned it to CD. It booted with a strange Linux error. It turned out the downloaded image was 50 MB too small. Don't know why. Did another download from another site, and had a correct iso. That was too big for a CD: 740.000.000+ bytes. So I needed to burn it to DVD. My Nero refused to do that (it only wanted to do it to CD). So I had to use IMGBURN to burn it to DVD. Then I could boot from it.

Kees

I can't tell if the CD is booting on other machines.

Out of sheer frustration with not being able to boot from my bootable cd (system had gone down, and I couldn't make the needed bios changes to boot specs).

Placed disk in cd tray--left it open.
turned machine on
pushed in cd tray
hit F2 key