XP won't boot up

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Guest

I am trying to assist a friend with a computer problem. She has XP Pro with
SP2 and everything was fine until 2 days ago. XP does not boot up and she
gets a totally blank screen. She does not have the XP installation disk, so I
have tried to do both a repair install and to access recovery console with my
own XP Home installation disk, neither of which work. When trying safe mode,
the screen seems to list lots of locations for drivers etc, but it won't boot
up in safe mode.

She tells me that she hasn't made any changes to software or hardware.
Naturally, she wants to try to keep the files she has on the computer.

When I tried to access Recovery Console, I pressed 1 for the selected
Windows installation, but nothing futher happened.

I'd welcome any suggestions. Incidentally, I only found out a few moments
ago that it was the Pro version of XP. I do have a Pro disk, should I try
that?

Many Thanks in advance

Andy
 
Andy said:
I am trying to assist a friend with a computer problem. She has XP Pro
with SP2 and everything was fine until 2 days ago. XP does not boot up
and she gets a totally blank screen. She does not have the XP
installation disk, so I have tried to do both a repair install and to
access recovery console with my own XP Home installation disk, neither
of which work. When trying safe mode, the screen seems to list lots of
locations for drivers etc, but it won't boot up in safe mode.

She tells me that she hasn't made any changes to software or hardware.
Naturally, she wants to try to keep the files she has on the computer.

When I tried to access Recovery Console, I pressed 1 for the selected
Windows installation, but nothing futher happened.

I'd welcome any suggestions. Incidentally, I only found out a few
moments ago that it was the Pro version of XP. I do have a Pro disk,
should I try that?
Click to expand...

What exactly does a "totally blank screen" mean? Do you see anything
after you push the power button to turn on the computer? Does the
machine go through POST and then you can't see anything? Focused
troubleshooting depends on your answers. Don't do anything else on the
machine yet or you may lose her data.

Malke
 
Thanks for the reply. The computer powers up and the Windows XP screen
appears with the moving blocks then the screen goes blank and nothing happens.
Hope this helps.

Best Regards

Andy
 
Andy said:
Thanks for the reply. The computer powers up and the Windows XP screen
appears with the moving blocks then the screen goes blank and nothing
happens. Hope this helps.

Best Regards

Andy
Click to expand...

Can you get into Safe Mode or do Last Known Good Configuration? This
would be the next step, not the Recovery Console. Do this by repeatedly
tapping the F8 key as the computer is starting up. This will get you to
the right menu. Navigate using your Up arrow key; the mouse will not
work here. Let me know the results.

Malke
 
From the original post:
When trying safe mode, the screen seems to list lots of locations for
drivers etc, but it won't boot up in safe mode.
 
Just to confirm, I have tried booting in safe mode with and without prompts.
All that happens is a screen full of info like driver locations etc and safe
mode doesn't happen. We'e tried booting Windows normally and from Last Good
Configuration. In each of these last two cases the screen goes blank and
nothing happens.

There are no error messages. I tried a repair install using an XP Pro disk
and the files load but in the end I get an error message which says something
like" Setup cannot set the configuration. This Indicates an internal setup
error".

We've also tried accessing the Recovery Console. After selecting 1 for the
Windows installation and pressing enter, nothing happens.

I'm trying to avoid a clean install but it looks increasingly like the
inevitable step.

Thanks for any further assistance
 
[...
I'm trying to avoid a clean install but it looks increasingly lik the
inevitable step

Thanks for any further assistanc




There are a couple ways you can try to salavge her data: 1) Boo
Click to expand...
from the install disc and install Windows to a different director
without formatting the drive, boot into the new install as admin an
you should be able to see the contents of the drive; 2) put the driv
in another machine as a slave and boot logging in as admin whic
should again allow you to see the contents of the drive with the ba
install
In either case, after you get the data, you should wipe the driv
Click to expand...
and do a clean install. All this is assuming it is actually a ba
install and not a different issue causing the problem
 
Andy said:
Just to confirm, I have tried booting in safe mode with and without
prompts. All that happens is a screen full of info like driver
locations etc and safe mode doesn't happen. We'e tried booting Windows
normally and from Last Good Configuration. In each of these last two
cases the screen goes blank and nothing happens.

There are no error messages. I tried a repair install using an XP Pro
disk and the files load but in the end I get an error message which
says something like" Setup cannot set the configuration. This
Indicates an internal setup error".

We've also tried accessing the Recovery Console. After selecting 1 for
the Windows installation and pressing enter, nothing happens.

I'm trying to avoid a clean install but it looks increasingly like the
inevitable step.
Click to expand...

You can get her data off by either slaving the drive in a working XP
machine, using a Bart's PE, or by booting with Knoppix. Here is the
information about using Knoppix:

An easy way to retrieve Windows files is to boot with Knoppix, a Linux
distro on a live cd. You will need a computer with two cd drives, one
of which is a cd/dvd-rw OR a usb thumb drive with enough capacity to
hold your data. To get Knoppix, you need a computer with a fast
Internet connection and third-party burning software. Download the
Knoppix .iso from www.knoppix.net and create your bootable cd. Then
boot with it and it will be able to see the Windows files. If you are
using the usb thumb drive, right-click on its icon (on the Desktop) to
get its properties and uncheck the box that says "Read Only". Then
click on it to open it. Note that the default mouse action in the
window manager used by Knoppix (KDE) is a single click to open instead
of the traditional MS Windows' double-click. Otherwise, use the K3b
burning program to burn the files to cd/dvd-r's.

http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/ (Bart's PE)

Malke
 
Boot from the XP CD.
Proceed to the install screen.
One of the options will be Repair install.
Try that.
 
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