XP Uninstall hang up

[Guest]

I put XP over ME on an older computer. XP installed but was causing too many
of my programs not to work. I started the XP Uninstall process. The process
won't finish now. The computer re-started and it starts "checking hardware
to uninstall" (or something like that) when the computer re-starts. Then it
goes to a blue screen about shutting down to prevent damage to the computer.
My ME boot disk still works, but it hasn't done me any good. I got a message
that went something like, 0x00000023. Any suggestions?

If I pull this hard drive out and plug in into another computer as a
secondary/slave drive, can I copy the important data to the new computer and
then wipe out the old hard drive and begin again?

 

[Steve N.]

I put XP over ME on an older computer. XP installed but was causing too many
of my programs not to work. I started the XP Uninstall process. The process
won't finish now. The computer re-started and it starts "checking hardware
to uninstall" (or something like that) when the computer re-starts. Then it
goes to a blue screen about shutting down to prevent damage to the computer.
My ME boot disk still works, but it hasn't done me any good. I got a message
that went something like, 0x00000023. Any suggestions?

If I pull this hard drive out and plug in into another computer as a
secondary/slave drive, can I copy the important data to the new computer and
then wipe out the old hard drive and begin again?

Possibly, it's certainly worth a try. You may have file system errors on
the disk that could prevent data from copying, in that case a scandisk
or chkdsk /f (depending on the OS of the machine you slave it to) might
be in order.

Steve

 

[Plato]

I put XP over ME on an older computer. XP installed but was causing too many
of my programs not to work. I started the XP Uninstall process. The process
won't finish now. The computer re-started and it starts "checking hardware

If I pull this hard drive out and plug in into another computer as a
secondary/slave drive, can I copy the important data to the new computer and
then wipe out the old hard drive and begin again?

In theory yes.

 

[Guest]

Any other suggestions before I go with the most drastic option?

 

[Steve N.]

Any other suggestions before I go with the most drastic option?

:

Well, no matter what you do I suggest you take measures to backup your
data first because if the file system or disk is damaged badly you could
lose it all at this point. Try slaving the drive in a working PC and see
if you can get to the data as suggested.

Then you might try a repair install of the XP upgrade, if that goes
successfully then try the XP uninstall again. This is just a thought,
I've never tried it myself in the situation you face but it might work.

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

Good luck and please keep us informed.

Steve