Windows XP reboot loop

[jm]

Started to play Everquest (after their latest patch)...
When at the login screen, the PC froze... I hit CTRL-ALT-
DEL, and got a white mouse pointer in the center of the
screen, but PC was still frozen.

Kept on hitting Ctrl-alt-del a few dozen times... but
nothing happened.

Hit the reset button, and now, the PC keeps rebooting. I
get to the Windows XP loading screen (the black screen
with the small animated green bar)... then it reboots.

I get the option to boot into safe mode, with last known
good configuration... Debugging mode, logging mode...
nothing works... it just keeps rebooting.

I have my restore CDs, but running those will wipe my
drive. I've got gigs and gigs of data I don't want to
wipe. (I know, backup backup backup...)

Could it be because of all those Ctrl-=Alt-Deletes I kept
hitting? Is it a simple matter of waiting for the PC to
catch up to them? Or is it more serious?

Will using a boot CD (other than a recovery CD) help? How
so, and how do I get one?

Thanks...

-J-

 

[Kelly]

Hi,

Suggestions:

Computer Stops Responding with a Black Screen When You Start Windows
http://support.microsoft.com/directory/article.asp?ID=KB;EN-US;q314503

Windows XP Stops Responding at the Welcome Screen
http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q294/4/27.asp

How to Perform a Clean Boot in Windows XP
How to Use Clean Boot Troubleshooting for Windows XP
How to Troubleshoot By Using the Msconfig Utility in Windows XP
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_conflicts.htm

How to Recover from a Corrupted Registry that Prevents Windows XP from
Starting
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;en-us;q307545

How to Disable a Service that Prevents Windows XP from Booting
http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q244/9/05.asp

Use System Files to Create a Boot Disk to Guard Against Being Unable to
Start Win XP http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_setup.htm

Perform an In-Place Upgrade (Reinstallation) of Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q315341

/top10faqs.htm


Nope. Not a victim. Scanned for viruses with the latest versions
of 2 virus checkers the day before this happened. No viruses at
all.

 

[Ron Martell]

Started to play Everquest (after their latest patch)...
When at the login screen, the PC froze... I hit CTRL-ALT-
DEL, and got a white mouse pointer in the center of the
screen, but PC was still frozen.

Kept on hitting Ctrl-alt-del a few dozen times... but
nothing happened.

Hit the reset button, and now, the PC keeps rebooting. I
get to the Windows XP loading screen (the black screen
with the small animated green bar)... then it reboots.

I get the option to boot into safe mode, with last known
good configuration... Debugging mode, logging mode...
nothing works... it just keeps rebooting.

I have my restore CDs, but running those will wipe my
drive. I've got gigs and gigs of data I don't want to
wipe. (I know, backup backup backup...)

Could it be because of all those Ctrl-=Alt-Deletes I kept
hitting? Is it a simple matter of waiting for the PC to
catch up to them? Or is it more serious?

Will using a boot CD (other than a recovery CD) help? How
so, and how do I get one?

You appear to be in some serious difficulty.

Can you get into the Windows XP Recovery Console? Is that option
presented on your startup menu?

If so, choose that option and when it halts at the command prompt
enter the following command:

CHKDSK /R

If it is a hard drive data structure problem that is causing the
problem then that should repair it and allow you to boot into Windows
again.

I suspect that your reset button push may have occurred during a
critical point when data was being written to the hard drive, thereby
resulting in scrambled data structures.

Also you appear to have another computer, or at least access to one.
Is that also running Windows XP?

If so then you could remove the hard drive from the problem computer
and install it temporarily as a second hard drive in the working
computer. Then you can use CHKDSK on that computer to repair the
data structure on the hard drive, if that is what is causing the
problem. Or at least you could copy off your data files to the other
hard drive or burn them to a CD.

Good luck


Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca

"The reason computer chips are so small is computers don't eat much."