Cannot get past WinXP starting up screen

[Martin C]

Not sure what has caused this problem, but whenever I try to start up WinXP
Home SP2, I get as far as the initial startup screen (the black one with the
WinXP logo in vga mode and the blue 'Knight Rider' scanning gif below it.
You see the HDD activate for a while, then it just hangs there ad nausium.

I have tried going into Safe mode and going back a restore point (I had
installed a PC magazine cover full version of Paragon Disk Manager, but have
not done anything with it yet. I had also been able to get into XP after it
had been installed anyway.) Going into Safe mode, I cannot find anything
obviously wrong - no adware, no viruses, no odd changes in the msconfig.

I should also mention at this point that I sometimes have trouble starting
up the PC in the first place (before I even get to the logo screen - the
monitor does not come out of standby). Not sure if that is related or not.

The question is:
What normally happens at the vga logo startup that could be causing this
hang up. I eventually managed to get into windows by selecting the 'Use a
configuration that used to work' option, but it still hangs sometimes.

Is there anything I can do to find the culprit?

TIA

Martin

 

[Eric]

If you have the Windows XP install CD try performing a repair install.

That and other recovery methods are provided on this page:

Recover and Repair Windows XP When a Computer Crashes or Fails to Boot
-

http://www.pcbuyerbeware.co.uk/Recovering_Windows_XP.htm

You can also buy a DVD with Windows Vista Beta 2 on it from Microsoft
for next to nothing. You could install it on a separate partition if it
meets the installation requirements.

Microsoft is urging its customers to order the DVD instead of try
downloading the beta, because the great demand is slowing down its
servers and is affecting other users of Microsoft's site.

If the demand is high, you might not be able to obtain a download.
Alternatively, you can order it on DVD costing $6.00 per disc.
According to Microsoft, each customer can order up to five discs. -
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/preview.mspx

Eric,
PC Buyer Beware!
http://www.pcbuyerbeware.co.uk/

 

[Guest]

There might be some helpful suggestions here
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=308041

 

[Patrick Keenan]

Not sure what has caused this problem, but whenever I try to start up WinXP
Home SP2, I get as far as the initial startup screen (the black one with the
WinXP logo in vga mode and the blue 'Knight Rider' scanning gif below it.
You see the HDD activate for a while, then it just hangs there ad nausium.

I have tried going into Safe mode and going back a restore point (I had
installed a PC magazine cover full version of Paragon Disk Manager, but have
not done anything with it yet. I had also been able to get into XP after it
had been installed anyway.) Going into Safe mode, I cannot find anything
obviously wrong - no adware, no viruses, no odd changes in the msconfig.

I should also mention at this point that I sometimes have trouble starting
up the PC in the first place (before I even get to the logo screen - the
monitor does not come out of standby). Not sure if that is related or not.

The question is:
What normally happens at the vga logo startup that could be causing this
hang up. I eventually managed to get into windows by selecting the 'Use a
configuration that used to work' option, but it still hangs sometimes.

Is there anything I can do to find the culprit?

TIA

Martin

I've had suspiciously good luck, three times in a row on three different
machines, in fixing startup, cycling reboot and keyboard lockup problems by
simply removing the swap file, which forces it to rebuild.

I stumbled on this because I normally image drives before I work on them (to
prevent data loss) and I remove the swap and hibernation files first rather
than back them up. It surprised me when the machines just suddenly started
working properly when I put the drives back and hadn't done anything else to
them.

You can do this in a few ways, but one of the quickest is to pop the drive
out (or use an external USB connector) and connect it to another XP system.
Simply delete the pagefile.sys (and hiberfil.sys) file, it's in the root,
disconnect and put the drive back. Restart.

If you can get into Windows in regular mode, right-click on My Computer,
choose Properties. Go to the Advanced tab and click on settings in the
Performance section. Click on Advanced, then Change in the Virtual Memory
section. On this page, choose No Paging File and Set, then OK. Shut the
system down and restart in Safe Mode, go to the root and delete the file
"pagefile.sys".

Shut the system down and restart normally. Go back and turn the paging
file on again, and restart again.

HTH
-pk

 

[Martin C]

Thanks for all the replies guys. I will keep a record of them for later. For
now, things seem to be running ok again - which is rather spooky as I have
no idea what caused the problem in the first place. I have put the
applications that went missing from the restore point back onto the PC and
this does not seem to have caused the problem again.
It is all a bit weird.

Thanks for the help.
Martin