Unable to boot from Install CD

[Jeff S.]

I'm running WinXP SP2 on a P4, 1GB RAM. Background: for the past several
months I've been noticing some gibberish characters in the POST; also some of
my icons both in Windows and inside apps have distorted colors and graphics,
but still function OK. This morning system had rebooted and hung in POST.
Rebooted and noticed bad sounds from a HD; rebooted and system went through
POST and hung at Win logo screen. Gibberish characters now more prevalent in
POST text and also now in BIOS setup. Pulled video card and replaced it with
an older but functional card. All gibberish characters gone, but system
proceeds to Win logo screen, progress bar spins for 10 seconds or so, blue
screen appears and immediately reboots.

I thought I'd try a fixmbr command, or do a repair from the Repair Console,
but now I cannot boot from the CD. I have checked the BIOS boot order (and
even disabled all other options) but when the POST gets to "press any key to
boot from CD" it seems the keyboard is nonresponsive at that point in the
process. Also--I cannot boot into safe mode.

I'm stumped. Any insight would be appreciated.

 

[thecreator]

Hi Jeff,

Make sure that you don't have more than one MBR on the Hard Drive. If
you do, delete the second one. You can use BootItNG from
http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/bootitng.html .

If you only have one per Hard Drive, then replace the Hard Drive. Make
the new one the Master and the current Hard drive, a slave until you pull
any files you need or want off the current Hard Drive. After you get the
files, you want, then remove the old Hard Drive. Otherwise, the old Hard
Drive can pull performance down.

 

[philo]

I'm running WinXP SP2 on a P4, 1GB RAM. Background: for the past several
months I've been noticing some gibberish characters in the POST; also some of
my icons both in Windows and inside apps have distorted colors and graphics,
but still function OK. This morning system had rebooted and hung in POST.
Rebooted and noticed bad sounds from a HD; rebooted and system went through
POST and hung at Win logo screen. Gibberish characters now more prevalent in
POST text and also now in BIOS setup. Pulled video card and replaced it with
an older but functional card. All gibberish characters gone, but system
proceeds to Win logo screen, progress bar spins for 10 seconds or so, blue
screen appears and immediately reboots.

I thought I'd try a fixmbr command, or do a repair from the Repair Console,
but now I cannot boot from the CD. I have checked the BIOS boot order (and
even disabled all other options) but when the POST gets to "press any key to
boot from CD" it seems the keyboard is nonresponsive at that point in the
process. Also--I cannot boot into safe mode.

If you are using a USB keyboard... you may need to use a PS/2 type.

 

[Jeff S.]

If you are using a USB keyboard... you may need to use a PS/2 type.

I did try that with an old PS/2 keyboard I had lying around. No luck.

 

[Patrick Keenan]

I'm running WinXP SP2 on a P4, 1GB RAM. Background: for the past several
months I've been noticing some gibberish characters in the POST; also some
of
my icons both in Windows and inside apps have distorted colors and
graphics,
but still function OK. This morning system had rebooted and hung in POST.
Rebooted and noticed bad sounds from a HD; rebooted and system went
through
POST and hung at Win logo screen. Gibberish characters now more prevalent
in
POST text and also now in BIOS setup. Pulled video card and replaced it
with
an older but functional card. All gibberish characters gone, but system
proceeds to Win logo screen, progress bar spins for 10 seconds or so, blue
screen appears and immediately reboots.

I thought I'd try a fixmbr command, or do a repair from the Repair
Console,
but now I cannot boot from the CD. I have checked the BIOS boot order
(and
even disabled all other options) but when the POST gets to "press any key
to
boot from CD" it seems the keyboard is nonresponsive at that point in the
process. Also--I cannot boot into safe mode.

I'm stumped. Any insight would be appreciated.

Physically disconnect the hard disk and reboot to the CD. and resolve the
basic system issues .

HTH
-pk