XP freezes on startup

[Drew]

Every time I try to start my computer, it gets to the
starting windows xp screen, and freezes. I cannot even
reinstall XP because the install freezes at the same
point. I have a 700MHz Athlon and an Asus K7V MB, 256 MB
RAM. I installed the latest bios updates for the MB, and
Asus says that it supports XP, still no help. Any
suggestions?

 

[James Martin]

Try using the recovery console (Boot with WinXP cd, choose
recover). Edit your boot.ini file in the root directory by
adding the /sos command at the end of the string for
Windows XP Professional like so:

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft
Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /sos

When you boot, it will display everything as it loads and
you should be able to see what is causing the problem.
(Assuming you already tried safe mode, etc)

-James