Here's our Windows NT Tip for.. May 5, 1998
Click Here to see a complete list of all of our previously released Tips!
Boot.INI Switches
We've given you a few tips in the past showing how to edit your BOOT.INI file in order to affect your NT Startup. Most recently we talked about Watch your Startup, Short term memory loss and Quick Disable for Multiple Processors. Well, how about we give you the whole list of BOOT.INI switches at once? There's a lot more you can do to change your NT startup.

/BASEVIDEO The computer starts up using the standard VGA video driver. If you have installed a new video driver, but it is not working correctly, selecting the Windows NT entry with this switch enables you to start the computer so you can change to a different driver.

/BAUDRATE Specifies the baud rate to be used for debugging. If you do not set the baud rate, the default baud rate is 9600 if a modem is attached, and 19200 for a null-modem cable. This switch has a secondary effect of forcing the /DEBUG switch as well, whether or not use you use /DEBUG.

/CRASHDEBUG The debugger is loaded when you start Windows NT, but remains inactive unless a Kernel error occurs. This mode is useful if you are experiencing random, unpredictable Kernel errors.

/DEBUG The debugger is loaded when you start Windows NT, and can be activated at any time by a host debugger connected to the computer. This is the mode to use when you are debugging problems that are regularly reproducible.

/DEBUGPORT= comx Specifies the com port to use for debugging, where x is the communications port that you want to use. Like /BAUDRATE, this switch will also force the /DEBUG mode.

/MAXMEM:n Specifies the maximum amount of RAM that Windows NT can use. This switch is useful if you suspect a memory chip is bad.

/NODEBUG No debugging information is being used.

/NOSERIALMICE=[COMx | COMx,y,z...] Disables serial mouse detection of the specified COM port(s). Use this switch if you have a component other than a mouse attached to a serial port during the startup sequence. If you use /NOSERIALMICE without specifying a COM port, serial mouse detection is disabled on all COM ports.

/SOS Displays the driver names while they are being loaded. Use this switch if Windows NT won’t start up and you think a driver is missing.

/ONECPU Disables all but the first processor in a multiple CPU machine.