freezes at the safe mode selection screen

[traumajohn]

Hi,
I have a toshiba laptop and it started shutting down automatically. I
cleaned out teh cpu fan and tract reconnected, verified fan works and now I
get stuck at teh safe mode selection screen. The timer counts down to zero
and freezes, I try to boot into safemode and the drivers start to install and
it freezes at the end of the data but doesn't load. Same with last known good
config. I am lost with a frozen system.
Thanks,
John

 

[Luis]

Hi John,

It seems the XP has got corrupted, we can try to start in recovery console,
put the XP cd on boot and when prompted press R to enter in command mode.

There you can execute
sfc /scannow
to check problems and
sfc /purgecache
to try top solve them

If this is still not working, your best option is to make a repair
installation of XP
Boot again with the XP cd and this time press enter to install, F8 to accept
the EULA and there, press R, this will copy all the system files on your
computer and hopefully repair the system so you can log in.

This wont delete any app nor data that you have on your computer.

Regards,

Luis.

 

[traumajohn]

Hi Luis,
I went into repair mode and tried to enter at the c:\windows prompt sfc
/scannow and I was unable to run that command. I also tried at the c:\windows
sfc /purgecache and no success running that command either.
John

 

[Luis]

Hi John,

Yes, I was wrong, from the recovery console you dont have access to the sfc
command.

Are you able to get into Safe Mode With Command Promp?

If so, there you can enter the command, anyway, I would go directly for the
reparation install or try a program like RDCommander to repair the system.

Regards,
Luis.

 

[traumajohn]

Hi Luis,
I couldn't get to any of the safe mode selections at all. I did something
and I don't know of Microsfoft would agree with my idea. I put the laptop hdd
in my external cradle and connected it to my other pc. I copied the missing
comdlg32.dll from the good pc to the troubled hdd and got it to boot. I then
went to the recovery file and was going to do a manual recovery but saw that
the recovery folder was empty. So now, with the laptop still having some
slowness issues and display issues after my file replacement and not being
able to restore to an earlier date. I decided to reinstall. No problem except
it is very time consuming to reinstall all the programs. I was, however able
to save all my datea, music, and pictures so it is not a total loss.
Thanks again,
John

 

[Luis]

John,

Yes, that missing .dll was the reason I wanted to run the sfc command, you
never mencioned it before!, copying missing or corrupted .dlls from other
machine is one of the basic things you do when having an error like yours
so: well done!!!

Next time, the reparation install is a good option if you dont want to
reinstall all your apps and so on.

Glad that you solved the problem!

Luis.