Boot failure: System halted

[litwakfamily]

I was just now working along in XP, when I started hearing odd noises
from m computer and the CD ROM started misbehaving, playing the same
few notes of a song over and over. The system froze. I lost all
keyboard and mouse capability. I turned off the power and turned it
back on. Instead of the computer needing to be turned on after I
turned on the power supply, the computer started immediatley. I
turned off hte computer and restarted it. I've now done this three
times. Each time, I see messages on the screen about the client mac
address, something about DHCP and a spinning slash mark, and then
PXE M0F; Exiting Intel PXE ROM
Boot Failure: System halted.

What does this probably mean? Is my hard drive dead? How can I
tell? Since you can't book an XP system from DOS, there's really no
way to check the hard drive that I know of. Any suggestions please?
What can I do to solve this crisis please? Thanks.

Duncan

 

[Jerry]

The motherboard could have died or failed somehow, the power supply could be
failing, the CD ROM could be dieing.

You can boot from the XP CD itself and then see if it can determine if
anything is available. You would have to go into the BIOS to change the boot
order to make the CD first and your statement indicates this is not a
possibility.

Do you have floppy drive? Is it in the boot order? BIOS option again.

 

[litwakfamily]

The motherboard could have died or failed somehow, the power supply could be
failing, the CD ROM could be dieing.

You can boot from the XP CD itself and then see if it can determine if
anything is available. You would have to go into the BIOS to change the boot
order to make the CD first and your statement indicates this is not a
possibility.

Do you have floppy drive? Is it in the boot order? BIOS option again.

Thanks for these suggestions. I was able to boot from the Windows XP
CD I asked it to repair the Windows installation. That took me to a
DOS prompt for the C drive. When I typed dir, it said
"No floppy disk or CD in drive".
When I typed dir d:
it gave me a list of the directories on the Windows Does this mean
that my hard drive is borken or that the disk needs some kind of file
repair, like the boot sector? How could I do that? I have a zip
drive and I tried reading that but I got a message that no such path
existed. I was hopiong to cop y backup files form the zip disk onto
a memory stick but I can't seem to get DOS to find either drive. AN
way to do that? Thanks.

Duncan

 

[litwakfamily]

One other thing I did not mention is that when the system shows the
Client Mac Sddr is says "Boot filename not received." Is that of any
help in diagnosis? Thanks.


Duncan

 

[Anna]

I was just now working along in XP, when I started hearing odd noises
from m computer and the CD ROM started misbehaving, playing the same
few notes of a song over and over. The system froze. I lost all
keyboard and mouse capability. I turned off the power and turned it
back on. Instead of the computer needing to be turned on after I
turned on the power supply, the computer started immediatley. I
turned off hte computer and restarted it. I've now done this three
times. Each time, I see messages on the screen about the client mac
address, something about DHCP and a spinning slash mark, and then
PXE M0F; Exiting Intel PXE ROM
Boot Failure: System halted.

What does this probably mean? Is my hard drive dead? How can I
tell? Since you can't book an XP system from DOS, there's really no
way to check the hard drive that I know of. Any suggestions please?
What can I do to solve this crisis please? Thanks.

Duncan

Duncan:
From your description it certainly sounds like a hardware failure of some
sort - possibly involving a defective HDD.

One of the first things you should do is download the HDD diagnostic utility
that is usually available from the website of the manufacturer of your HDD
and check out the HDD. This diagnostic utility can be created either as a
bootable floppy disk or bootable CD. (Since you were able to post your
message, I'm assuming you have another PC available to you).

In the event this is not a hardware-related problem involving the HDD or
some other component in your machine, you could also attempt a Repair
install of the XP OS using your XP installation CD, assuming you have such a
CD, i.e., you're not working with an OEM machine that has only a recovery
type of CD. Again, from your description of the problem I don't think you'll
be even able to effect a Repair install but give it a try.

Another thing to consider assuming you're working with a unbootable
dysfunctional HDD is to connect the disk to another working machine as a
secondary drive and try to access & copy any files that are important to
you. So if worse comes to worse at least you'll have some sort of backup if
& when you need to install a fresh HDD assuming it comes to that.
Anna

 

[Patrick Keenan]

I was just now working along in XP, when I started hearing odd noises
from m computer and the CD ROM started misbehaving, playing the same
few notes of a song over and over.

These are called beep codes, from the BIOS, and while helpful are never a
good sign. They indicate system component failure.

The system froze. I lost all
keyboard and mouse capability. I turned off the power and turned it
back on. Instead of the computer needing to be turned on after I
turned on the power supply, the computer started immediatley. I
turned off hte computer and restarted it. I've now done this three
times. Each time, I see messages on the screen about the client mac
address, something about DHCP and a spinning slash mark, and then
PXE M0F; Exiting Intel PXE ROM

These messages means that the system has failed to boot from hard disk or CD
and is trying to boot from the network.

Boot Failure: System halted.

What does this probably mean? Is my hard drive dead? How can I
tell? Since you can't book an XP system from DOS, there's really no
way to check the hard drive that I know of. Any suggestions please?
What can I do to solve this crisis please? Thanks.

Duncan

The very first question to ask now is, "how valuable is the data on this
system"?

If the answer is that it's of any value to you at all, and you'd like to
keep it, cease trying to start that machine, until you've removed the drive
and backed it up by some other means. An easy way to do that is to
attach it to another system (setting jumpers appropriately) and just copying
the data you want off. Try to get your mail and address books too.
Another easy way is to use the Acronis TrueImage trial version and create an
image of your drive. This can often be *much* faster than copying the
files, despite the fact that it will take *everything*.

Keep in mind that if the drive has failed or is failing, you won't have much
time. The phrase "on its last legs" can mean something. Have everything
in place and ready to go before attching the drive, and work as quickly as
you can.

It's possible that the drive is fine, that it's board components that have
failed. In that case, you've been prudent and backed up your data.

If you need to get back to work as soon as possible, install another drive
in the system and reinstall XP and the apps you need to work. Get the
data later. Indeed, you can use the new drive to help recover the old one.

Finally, it's possible you may need to try data recovery software, or use a
data recovery service. You can ususally get a free demo version of
recovery software, but if those won't work, professional services are
available. I have seen bills ranging from CDN$1000 to CDN$5000 for
recovery.

HTH
-pk

 

[Patrick Keenan]

One other thing I did not mention is that when the system shows the
Client Mac Sddr is says "Boot filename not received." Is that of any
help in diagnosis? Thanks.


Duncan

That message is coming from the system's attempt to boot from network.
Your system isn't configured to boot from network, neither is your network,
so this is going to fail.

One thing though that it might indicate is that the BIOS CMOS memory has
corrupted. Get into the BIOS and reset it. ENsure that the hard disk
is detected and that it is set to boot from it, with the network boot far
down or not on the list. You can also (if it's a desktop) remove the
system battery, and use hte CMOS CLEAR jumper or switch to clear the CMOS;
then put the battery back in. On restart the system hardware will be
rescanned, and the date will be off by a decade or so.

But if you even suspect that the hard drive is damaged - don't poke at it,
go about recovery in a safe, considered manner. Get another hard disk
first. I see 250 gig hard disks for around CDN$75, and your data is
probably worth more than that. Remove your old drive, set it aside.
Install the new drive, install XP to it, (ensuring that it is detected as
Drive C - you can install to other partitions but this might indicate
another problem) and later, see what you can do to recover the data.

HTH
-pk

 

[litwakfamily]

Duncan:
From your description it certainly sounds like a hardware failure of some
sort - possibly involving a defective HDD.

One of the first things you should do is download the HDD diagnostic utility
that is usually available from the website of the manufacturer of your HDD
and check out the HDD. This diagnostic utility can be created either as a
bootable floppy disk or bootable CD. (Since you were able to post your
message, I'm assuming you have another PC available to you).

In the event this is not a hardware-related problem involving the HDD or
some other component in your machine, you could also attempt a Repair
install of the XP OS using your XP installation CD, assuming you have such a
CD, i.e., you're not working with an OEM machine that has only a recovery
type of CD. Again, from your description of the problem I don't think you'll
be even able to effect a Repair install but give it a try.

Sort version: The system was set up with an OEM version but some time
ago I bought my own full copy of XP which I installed on another, now
dead PC. Its hard drive is fine and I plan to switch them this
afternoon and see what I can do. Since I tried to do the Windows
Repair and that brought me to a C prompt, I'm guessing that this means
the system really can't find the hard drive. I appreciate very much
your advice and the advice of others but I have one big question.
Assuming that my hard drive has failed (which I'm guessing since I can
do a dir on D but not on C), doesn't that mean that the disk itself is
damaged? How could I plug the bad hard drive into another computer
and recover data? I'd love to do that but, not being a hardware
person, I don't understand how that could work. So please excuse me
for this. I'm not trying to disagree with anyone who has kindly
offered advice. I'm trying to understand how this might work.
Thanks.

Duncan

 

[Anna]

Sort version: The system was set up with an OEM version but some time
ago I bought my own full copy of XP which I installed on another, now
dead PC. Its hard drive is fine and I plan to switch them this
afternoon and see what I can do. Since I tried to do the Windows
Repair and that brought me to a C prompt, I'm guessing that this means
the system really can't find the hard drive. I appreciate very much
your advice and the advice of others but I have one big question.
Assuming that my hard drive has failed (which I'm guessing since I can
do a dir on D but not on C), doesn't that mean that the disk itself is
damaged? How could I plug the bad hard drive into another computer
and recover data? I'd love to do that but, not being a hardware
person, I don't understand how that could work. So please excuse me
for this. I'm not trying to disagree with anyone who has kindly
offered advice. I'm trying to understand how this might work.
Thanks.

Duncan

Duncan:
I'm really not sure I completely understand your latest comment, but let me
at least respond to your query as to "How could I plug the bad hard drive
into another computer and recover data?" We come across many instances where
the boot HDD, while not necessarily physically/electronically defective, is
dysfunctional in the sense that this or that data corruption existing on the
drive makes it unbootable. But its data can (hopefully!) still be accessed
if the disk is installed as a secondary HDD on a working PC so that the user
can access that data and copy what he or she needs. We recommend this
technique as an option when there exists critical data on the disk that the
user wants and/or needs. Does it always work? Of course not. The disk in
question may be sufficiently defective so that no data can be accessed
through those means. But it's an option.
Anna