I have a Compaq Presario S3000NX and My windows xp installation is
shot. I decided to run the system recovery on my computer. When I
started system recovery it asked me if I had run windows system
restore and I clicked no. It restarted the computer to try to do that
but because I can't run windows that didn't help and I had to restart
it. I then went back to run system recovery but It wouldn't run. When
I try to run it upon start up it goes to a black screen with a
blinking white dash in the top left. Any suggestions? My computer
didn't come with a windows installation cd and the system recovery is
built into the comupter, not on cds.

<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote

>I have a Compaq Presario S3000NX and My windows xp installation is
> shot. I decided to run the system recovery on my computer. When I
> started system recovery it asked me if I had run windows system
> restore and I clicked no. It restarted the computer to try to do that
> but because I can't run windows that didn't help and I had to restart
> it. I then went back to run system recovery but It wouldn't run. When
> I try to run it upon start up it goes to a black screen with a
> blinking white dash in the top left. Any suggestions? My computer
> didn't come with a windows installation cd and the system recovery is
> built into the comupter, not on cds.

Contact HP / Compaq tech support.

--
Rock [MS-MVP User/Shell]

"Rock" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote i

> <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote
>
>>I have a Compaq Presario S3000NX and My windows xp installation is
>> shot. I decided to run the system recovery on my computer. When I
>> started system recovery it asked me if I had run windows system
>> restore and I clicked no. It restarted the computer to try to do that
>> but because I can't run windows that didn't help and I had to restart
>> it. I then went back to run system recovery but It wouldn't run. When
>> I try to run it upon start up it goes to a black screen with a
>> blinking white dash in the top left. Any suggestions? My computer
>> didn't come with a windows installation cd and the system recovery is
>> built into the comupter, not on cds.
>
> Contact HP / Compaq tech support.

Let me add to that short reply. You're options are limited. If the OEM
provided recovery mechanism doesn't work you can contact their tech support
for help, or get a set or recovery CDs from them. If that's not an option
you can backup the data, assuming the drive is readable, then borrow an OEM
XP installation CD and see if it will install using the product key on the
sticker attached to the computer. If that doesn't work purchase a copy of
XP and do a clean install of XP. In either of these last two scenarios
you'll need to get the XP compatible drivers from the HP / Compaq web site.

Here are some ways to backup the data:

1. Take the drive out of the computer and install it as a slave drive in
another Windows XP or 2000 computer. It should read the drive ok, so you can
copy the data.

2. Create a bootable Bart's PE disk, boot from that, then copy the data to
external USB drive or flash drive.

3. Download a bootable Linux distro called Knoppix. Create a bootable CD
from that, boot from it, and copy the data to USB drive or flash drive, or
if the computer has two CD drives, one of which is a burner, then use the
k3b burning program on the Knoppix CD to burn the data to CD.

4. Take it to a competent computer tech to backup the data.

You could also download a drive diagnostic utility from the hard drive
manufacturer's web site. That will create a bootable floppy or CD. Boot
from that and run the diagnostics.

--
Rock [MS-MVP User/Shell]