XP won't boot, Recovery gives setupdd.sys error 7

[Jeff]

A few days ago, my neighbor's computer stopped booting into Windows XP. The
computer begins the boot-up but hangs just prior to the "Starting Windows XP"
splash screen. I tried to restore/recover using his retail XP disk and all we
get is "Windows has detected several unrecoverable errors". Then it gives the
error "Could not load setupdd.sys. Error7"

The operating system is XP Home SP2.

Has anyone seen this before?

Thanks for any help anyone can give.

 

[Mark L. Ferguson]

You can try downloading the hard drive diagnostic software from the drive
makers site, but the disk is probably gone.

 

[Jeff]

Thanks for the suggestion, Mark. I will try it tomorrow evening and let you
know how it goes....