Boot Disk Problem

[ROYP123]

Need some ideas- working on an older PC. 166 mhz. trying to format the HD and re load Win 95. I fdisked-deleted the partition and repartioned, but the PC will not boot from a boot disk. It says " remove disk and press any key." Without the boot disk it says " missing operating system " I unplugged the HD and it booted from the boot disk. I connected the HD and tried to format, but unable. I tried WIN 98 boot disk that has CD Rom support, and tried to format, but it said unable to create partiton. I can read the ciontents of the " A" drive boot disk, but it won"t boot from it while the HD connected. Changed the BIOS to boot C/A then tried A/C. Same thing. It uses the old Intel 430VX chipset. Any ideas why it stopped booting from a boot disk? ( It is on an AT form in a tiny box that is crammed with ribbons, etc. I had everything out and back in. It booted okay out of the box but I did not try a boot disk while out of the box. Did I connect something wrong? How fix?Should I load an OS on the HD on another PC? Ideas? Thanks

[edge345]

Load the win98 boot disk at the a prompt type format c:
then enter the Bios and see if the system is seeing the harddrive.

When you f-disked the hard drive are you sure you created a partition and when asked to activate it you said yes....