Will not re-boot after "exiting setup" on Windows XP

[rickw]

Tried to install XP over 98. Set-up found files it could not copy, options were to "try again", "skip" or "exit set-up". Choose "exit set-up". Restart tries to boot but reaches a list of "the following files are missing or corrupt" ( HIGHMEM.SYS, EMM 386.EXE, DBLBUFF.SYS, IFSHLP.SYS, COMMAND.COM) "type the name of the command interpreter (e.g., C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND.COM) This does not help. CONFIG.SYS has an error in line 1 and 2.

[Play_The_0dds]

if your disk for xp is damaged(scratched) or has finger prints it may just have a disk read problem, try cleaning the disk.
just to get straight with what you are trying to do, if you started the upgrade and it could not copy files, windows xp is not installed and will not boot, windows 98 is dead, xp kills it then starts it's install process. if you did not convert the drive to ntfs, it(may be) possible to install 98 back and still have your files. or boot from a good, or cleaned xp disk that can finnish the install. does your copy of xp boot the computer from startup, or is it a downloaded copy? if it is a downloaded copy did it have extraction errors when you unziped it?

[rickw]

Thought of that.... Was hoping to get to the dos prompt in safe mode to re-install 98 butttttttt... It's not reading the CD on startup and I can't get to dos (through the safe mode is the only way I know) for an install command.