CompuServe Messages

I've seen more than a couple of messages complaining about the same problem. I don't know what is causing it but I know the many reasons you would get this error. I don't think it is related to Pharlap. Let me start explaining how COMMAND.COM works. This is the program running when you see the C:> prompt. That's what's called "command shell". In order to save space, a very small portion of it gets loaded and stays resident all the time. The portions that go unused when you run a program are loaded and discarded when you load a program. When you exit the program, the resident portion of COMMAND.COM will check and see if the rest of itself is still intact. If the program you just loaded was big enough to overwrite it (the case with just about anything but very feel small programs) it has to load itself again in order to give you the command prompt (C:>). In order to do this, it has to know where to find itself. It uses an environment var called COMSPEC. Boot your computer and type SET alone at the command prompt. The very first variable you will see is COMSPEC. It should be something like: COMSPEC=C:\COMMAND.COM or COMSPEC=C:\DOS\COMMAND.COM Or wherever you have COMMAND.COM specified at the SHELL= line in CONFIG.SYS. Some versions of DOS will automatically set this variable in case you force COMMAND.COM to be loaded from some place else (with SHELL=). Others won't and you have to do it by hand in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file (with a statement like SET COMSPEC=C:\SOMEWHERE\COMMAND.COM). At any rate, when COMMAND.COM tries to load itself back in memory and it can't find it, that's the error message you get. The only way out of it is to reboot the computer. The possibilities are many. You may not have COMSPEC pointing to the right place. That's the easiest to fix. It could also be that the environment got corrupted and COMSPEC points to garbage. Try loading 3D Studio from a batch file like this: 3D SET The first command will load 3D Studio. The second will show your current environment right when you leave 3D Studio. Check to see where COMSPEC points to and see if it is valid. Check if any of the above either fixes or, at least, explain your problem. If not, I will have to think "harder" what it could all be.