Windows 2000 Hangs at ALL Startup Methods

[Dan]

I am having a problem I haven't experienced before with a Windows 2000
Pro computer. It was working fine, then one day, it died in the
middle of Outlook. Now, when it boots up, it freezes at the Windows
2000 startup screen when the progress bar fills to the end. If I try
to boot in safe mode, it freezes as well. It also freezes at the
recovery console when I choose the windows installation to repair.
Doing an actual repair install does nothing. And, when booting from a
Windows 2000 startup disk, it freezes at the same place as usual. I
can add the hard drive to another computer and view and copy data
on/off. Does anyone have any idea what could be going on. I, just
copied the data off and tried a fresh install, but it freezes when it
looks for previous installations. This is very annoying, and I know I
can wipe the drive and start from there, but I just wanted to know if
this sounds familiar to anyone or if anyone has any ideas. Thanks in
advance!

-D

 

[Alias]

You didn't happen to install an internal modem, did you?

Alias

 

[J.C. Hornbeck [MSFT]]

From your description it sounds like you may have some sort of hardware
issue, especially if it won't boot to
safe mode any longer and a repair fails. What I would probably do is start
removing hardware components one at a time (where possible) to see if it
starts booting. Often times you can narrow down the offending device that
way so at least you know what's causing the problem. You could also boot
and have it create a boot log. That way you might be able to figure out
where in the process that it's hanging.

--
J.C. Hornbeck, MCSE
Microsoft Product Support

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[Dan Seur]

You might have a failing drive or cable, or a new bad sector(s) on the
drive. The manufacturer's website will have a downloadable disk
diagnostic you can use if fiddling with cables doesn't halp.

You might also try to isolate the problem by physically removing all
cards except video, and if the stripped W2k boots then reinstall them
one by one until it fails to boot.

 

[Guest]

Hi,
I am experiencing a similar problem with a fresh installation onto an AMD XP2400 machine. Whatever you try, and I've tried plenty, it hangs just after the 'Starting Windows' progress bar completes.
It has been suggested to me that at this point Windows 2000 is switching from 16-bit real mode into 32-bit protected mode and there might be a fault with protected mode in the processor.
Perhaps someone with inside Microsoft information might be able to confirm or deny this as the solution (replace processor) is somewhat expensive.
I have seen similar problems to this reported around various newsgroups from time to time and never seen any reports of a sucessfull solution. We wait in hope.
Kevin.