Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!portal!cup.portal.com!schuster From: schuster@cup.portal.com (Michael Alan Schuster) Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware Subject: Re: 386: Packed File Corrupt error Message-ID: <39840@cup.portal.com> Date: 5 Mar 91 01:20:51 GMT References: Distribution: usa Organization: The Portal System (TM) Lines: 19 >I just upgraded from a 286 clone to a 386-33 clone. Norton 5.0 Unerase >and Pathminder both now give me the error "Packed File Corrupt" when >I attempt to execute them. I have DOS 4.01. These programs still >run fine on my wife's 286. Does anyone know what is going on? I >have throttled back to 16Mhz and turned off cacheing, all to no avail. The error message is generated by the decompression routine of EXEPACK, an executable file compressor that is used as a linker option in various Microsoft development packages/ Apparently the Norton files are linked using EXEPACK. The message does NOT mean the files are corrupted (at least not necessarily). It is caused by a bug in EXEPACK which manifests itself when A20 gating is enabled (i.e. either a high memory driver is accessing the upper RAM or, more commonly, due to failure of the ROM BIOS to disable A20 upon bootup). A BIOS upgrade may be in order. Failing that, there are floating around some utilities to turn off A20 so that RAM addressing wraps around from FFFF to 0000 the way EXEPACK expects it to.