How to Disable F5 and F8 During Startup in MS-DOS (93602)



The information in this article applies to:
    Microsoft MS-DOS operating system 6.0
    Microsoft MS-DOS operating system 6.2
    Microsoft MS-DOS operating system 6.21
    Microsoft MS-DOS operating system 6.22

This article was previously published under Q93602
MS-DOS 6.0 and later allow you to bypass both AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS by pressing the F5 key as you are starting your computer. This can disable the effectiveness of some password-protection schemes. In order to disable this feature, add the following line to CONFIG.SYS:

SWITCHES=/N

This line disables both the F5 and F8 keys, which allow you to modify your startup configuration during the boot process. Note: This line can be put anywhere in CONFIG.SYS.

Modification Type: Major Last Reviewed: 11/16/1999
Keywords: KB93602