Windows XP WinXP won't start and can't repair

[folud02]

Hi,

I've been having a serious problem with my system and I hope someone has ideas of how to resolve this. I'm running WinXP SP2 on a P4 PC with MSI 915P Combo MoBo. Total memory on the system is 1GB (DDR400) and HDD (Maxtor 160GB). Filesystem: (NTFS). The system is fairly new: built it about 9 months ago with brand new higher price-range components.

I was alarmed when noticed last week that my ZoneAlarm Security Suite didn't appear to be monitoring internet activity. I tried to restart it but nothing happened. I check the service log and realised there had been a problem since March. When all effort to get it working properly had failed (including successful system restore), I uninstalled and re-installed it. That worked and the ZASS was back on again. A couple of days later, I was notified by my siblings that the PC was re-bootingand wouldn't boot from Safe Mode or anything.

I tried it myself and I got the same result. Whatever mode of starting I choose (safe Mode, etc.), the PC would start and get to the Win XP Splash screen when it then flashes a blue screen and re-boot. This continues ad infinitum.

I tried to use the bootable installation disk to repair it. The setup programme would start but would not get to the point where I have options of fresh install, etc. The screen would become blue with the following message:

=======================================================================
a problem has been detected and windows has been shut down to prevent damage to your computer....

STOP: 0x0000007B (oxF7C7A524, 0xC0000034,0x00000000,0x00000000)
=======================================================================

Unfortunately, I haven't got ASR disks but I suspect that wouldn't have helped me either. I have run a memtest86 3 times and the result was fine.

I wonder if there is something else I can do to get my system back. Unfortunately, I can't format and do fresh install because I have several important documents on the machine which I have yet to backup (silly me, I know!) The only other observation I can make is that the casing tend to get very hot, but I'm not sure if this is due to the location of the PC - it's in my loft and it's generally very hot in there at the moment. The case display is showing temperature of 32.5 celcius.

Can anyone help? Thank you all.

 

[Anon_F]

The info i got was http://support.microsoft.com/kb/324103/en-us
Have a look at the above link does it help at all, if not post back again

 

[folud02]

Thanks Feckit. I'm not sure that doc is much help as I have already read through it. I'll take the suggested causes 1 by 1:



1. Boot Sector: I doubt this is a boot sector virus problem, but I could be wrong. My view is predicated on the fact that the system boots up normally and starts XP. It's XP that seems to be having problem because it flashes blue screen and reboot at the point when the log-on screen is about to come on. I presume that it shouldn't even get to that point if it were a boot virus issue (?)



2. Device Drivers: I haven't install any new devices recently



3. Other Hardware Issues: no new hardware installed - unless one of the current is messing up. Ran memtest86 diagnostic and it came back OK; ran Seagate diagnostic on HDD and it found a bad sector; but I have bought a new 200GB Maxtor SATA HDD and tried to install XP fresh, but I get exactly the same problem. So that seems to eliminate HDD. Could it be the MoBo or power supply?


Any more ideas of what could seem to be the problem would be greatly appreciated.

Also, how do I swap an HDD from one PC to another?

Thanks

 

[Me__2001]

what you need is a a copy of knoppix or another bootable OS and a USB flash drive

stick the CD in the drive the OS will load from the CD and you can bckup all of your docs, then format the HD and start again

 

[AbsoluteKevster]

If you can - get yourself a copy of the Winternals ERD (Emergency Repair Disk) Commander.
http://www.winternals.com/Products/AdministratorsPak/Default.aspx#erdcommander2005.

 

[Cache-man]

what you need is a a copy of knoppix or another bootable OS and a USB flash drive

stick the CD in the drive the OS will load from the CD and you can bckup all of your docs, then format the HD and start again

I had a similar situation a wile ago, as I'd fried my mobo, and hadent backed up some important files, and had to do a fresh install of XP as the mobo was a different brand.

So I used Knoppix linux distro live CD to find my important files and burned them to a CD-r Through linux.
A fresh install with the new mobo solved everything after wards.

You probabally may not have a dead mobo like me, but the linux live CD idea is still worth noting to back up your important files before anything else does horribly wrong and you lose your information.

It does sound like you have a hardware problem somewhere along the line.

Have you tried setting BIOS settings to default?

Have you tried removing ALL your hardware from your PC, and then installing ONLY essential hardware such as HDD, CPU/cooler, memory and graphics card. ensuring all are plugged in securely. NO optical drives opr add on cards or anything else yet.? If you still have this prob at this point, this narrows things to mobo, CPU, or most probabally HDD or memory. Providing it is a hardware issue.

 

[Cache-man]

what you need is a a copy of knoppix or another bootable OS and a USB flash drive

stick the CD in the drive the OS will load from the CD and you can bckup all of your docs, then format the HD and start again

I had a similar situation a wile ago, as I'd fried my mobo, and hadent backed up some important files, and had to do a fresh install of XP as the mobo was a different brand.

So I used Knoppix linux distro live CD to find my important files and burned them to a CD-r Through linux.
A fresh install with the new mobo solved everything after wards.

You probabally may not have a dead mobo like me, but the linux live CD idea is still worth noting to back up your important files before anything else does horribly wrong and you lose your information.

It does sound like you have a hardware problem somewhere along the line.

Have you tried setting BIOS settings to default?

Have you tried removing ALL your hardware from your PC, and then installing ONLY essential hardware such as HDD, CPU/cooler, memory and graphics card. ensuring all are plugged in securely. NO optical drives opr add on cards or anything else yet.? If you still have this prob at this point, this narrows things to mobo, CPU, or most probabally HDD or memory. Providing it is a hardware issue.

 

[Cache-man]

D'oh, sorry for the double post.

ADMIN - PLEASE REMOVE ONE OF MY DOUBLE POSTS from above. Thanks. (remove this one too if you need to.

 

[folud02]

Thanks to all of you for your contributions and apologies that I'm just posting back. I've been away and just returned.

However, I've exprienced some amazing things with my system that is simply beyond comprehension (for me anyway)!

I had my new HDD installed in the PC on SATA-1 slot and the old HDD on SATA-3 slot. To my amazement I got a message that boot disc couldn't be found. I went into the BIOS and found that the boot sequence did not choose any of my drives. I corrected this and re-booted. To my amazement, Win XP started to load and Chkdsk was run for what seemed an eternity. Chkdsk found many erorrs on the disk and undertook several corrections of orphaned files etc.I'd normally use CTRL+ALT+DEL at the logon screen. To my surprise, Win XP got me straight into the system without needing any password. Please note that I hadn't installed Win XP on my new HDD (in fact I hadn't been able to) and it's been set up in the BIOS as the default drive. I found that the new HDD now contains basic Win XP installation files (Program Files, WINDOWS, etc), but without any of the applications I had installed on the old one. In short I was able to move around the system including navigating the old problematic drive.

I took the old HDD out and I still got the same result. I swapped them around (old HDD in SATA-1 and the new in SATA-3 slot) and chkdsk was run again. This time I had to use CTRL+ALT+DEL to get in at the logon screen. Meanwhile, I'd copied all my needed files to the HDD as at least I have them on another drive. I also burned them on DVDs so they're safe.

I'm sure you're all thinking that my problem is solved - curious as the solution might have been. Well, you're all wrong because my PC is now shutting down after a short time and rebooting. Wile rebooting it'd always report that the boot disk couldn't be found. Going into BIOS, I'd see that my HDDs aren't detected. I'd always need to shut it down, turn of the electricity and re-start the PC before my HDD is detected again. I tried to fresh install XP, but I get the blue screen at the end of Setup ... (pls refer to my first posting).

What's going? Does anyone understand? I certainly don't!

thanks for any light you can shed on this.

 

[muckshifter]

Well, chkdsk should have been run with the "/r" switch ... go get Maxtor's PowerMax but take notice ...

Note: PowerMax v 4.21 will not detect ATA or SATA hard disks connected to embedded or add in RAID controllers, NVIDIA Force 4, VIA KT 600 and KT800 chipsets. If the hard disk is connected to an unsupported controller, it will have to be moved to an alternate system, or controller for diagnosis. Please check the PowerMax download page periodically for updates. Beginning September 1st 2006 all versions of PowerMax prior to v4.23 will no longer be supported. Maxtor recommends that you update to version 4.23 before testing your hard disk.

... catch 22 maybe?