Windows wo'nt boot!!!

[Guest]

When I try to start my computer, I get a screen that indicates I need to
start up in Safe mode, Safe mode networked, safe mode with prompt, revert
back to last known good, or normal windows. No matter which one I select,
the system loops back to this screen, over and over. How can I correct this.
Also, I have all my digital pics on my hard drive and I am afraid I will
lose these. How can I save these from being destroyed? I know, I should
have backed up to a disc. and I will as soon as I can fix this problem.

 

[Carey Frisch [MVP]]

How to Perform a Repair Install of Windows XP
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows - Shell/User
Microsoft Community Newsgroups
news://msnews.microsoft.com/

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:

| When I try to start my computer, I get a screen that indicates I need to
| start up in Safe mode, Safe mode networked, safe mode with prompt, revert
| back to last known good, or normal windows. No matter which one I select,
| the system loops back to this screen, over and over. How can I correct this.
| Also, I have all my digital pics on my hard drive and I am afraid I will
| lose these. How can I save these from being destroyed? I know, I should
| have backed up to a disc. and I will as soon as I can fix this problem.
| --
| Dr Dave

 

[Mike Hall - MS MVP Windows Shell/User]

Dr Dave

Rule #1.. do not wait until you have a problem before making backups (saving
to an external medium) of important stuff..

Rule #2.. do not wait until you have a problem before making backups (saving
to an external medium) of important stuff..

Rule #3.. do not wait until you have a problem before making backups (saving
to an external medium) of important stuff..

You may want to move your drive to another system and copy the files before
following the link that Carey gave to you..

 

[Guest]

Yes Mike,

I am an idiot!!! Should have backed up and now I have to take all the
abuse, which I knew was comming. Question - I had planned to do move the
hard drive to another computer, save the files to cd, then try to repair
using the recovery CD. But have been told that this might not work since it
appears to be the HD thats damaged. Any ideas on that?

 

[Mike Hall - MS MVP Windows Shell/User]

Dave

I repeated myself three times because six months ago, I lined up some stuff
for backup and lost it all two days before the scheduled backup.. the hard
drive completely crapped out..

In your case, the drive will not boot properly, but at least it is still
working of sorts.. so place it in another machine and get what you can from
it.. don't attempt to clone the drive.. just copy all of your important
stuff, documents, pictures, e-mail etc..when you are sure that you have it
all, place the drive back in your old machine, partition and reformat it,
reload the OS and then put back whatever you want from the CD(s)..

Personally, I would buy another drive, install the OS and other programs,
place the old drive in as a slave, and then recover stuff back off of it at
my leisure.. when sure, I would then reformat it, and use it as storage that
would not be affected if the OS crapped out again..

Still a good idea to have CD/DVD backups though..