On one of my computers, when you try to start it up, it reaches the windows xp loading screen, and then won't go any further. I don't have the xp install CD's or anything. I have recovery CD's, but I'd rather not lose everything in my hard drive, if possible. Obviously, by the fact I'm able to post this, I have another computer, with XP on it. I was hoping there was some way I could make an install CD, or something. I just want to fix the other computer without wiping my hard drive. any help would be greatly appreciated.

thank-you.

Welcome to Geeks2Go!

Try booting into "Last Known Good Configuration", usually lke this:

Turn on the PC and immediatelly keep pressing the F8 key continuously until the "Advanced Startup Options" screen appears.

Use the up/down arrow keys to highlight "last known good configuration" and press [Enter]

This post has been edited by pip22: Mar 26 2008, 03:52 AM

you can take the hard drive out and slave it to the working computer and get your data off and backed up
BEFORE we try anything else...

oh yeah, that was the part I forgot. I tried to get into the safe mode/configuration menu thing, and it just loaded up a bunch of jibberish crap, and froze. and i was just hoping I wouldn't have to pull my tower apart and take out the HDD and hook it up elsewhere in order to get everything off it. I just thought perhaps there was an easier, better way.

puppy will load and run totally in ram...

get puppy linux...Get puppy-2.16-seamonkey-fulldrivers.iso download it and burn it to cd ...if you don't have a burning program that will burn .ISO files go here and get burncdcc ..a small FAST no frills iso burning program...

NOTE...do not put a blank cd in until burncdcc opens the tray for you
1. Start BurnCDCC
2. Browse to the ISO file you want to burn on cd/dvd ......in this case its puppy linux
3. Select the ISO file
4. Suggestion.... Check the option "Fix close"
5. Click on "Start"

make sure in the bios the cd drive is the first boot device....put the cd in the cd drive..boot your computer....puppy will boot and run totally in ram...if your hardware is is good working order you will know...
after you get it running and your at the desktop...you take the puppy linux cd out and then you can use the burner to copy all yor data to cd/dvds
you can also use it to backup your data to a external usb harddrive..just have it hooked to the computer when you boot up with puppy...
==========================
quick guide for saving data...music..files on a system that will not boot using puppy Linux..


after you get to puppy desktop..
click on the drives icon...looks like a flash drive...top row..it will list all the drives connected to

your computer...

click on the red icon for the drive you want to mount...in this case its a flash drive ...puppy will

mount the drive..the drive icon turns green when its mounted...
minimize the drives mounter window..you will need it again in a few minutes..
drag the right edge of it sideways to shrink it to its narrowest size...then drag the window to the
right edge of the screen...

now click on the icon that looks like a filing cabinet (kind of yellow) on the main drive...it should
already be green..
you will see a list of all the folders on the main drive Usually your C: drive..shrink that window to

the narrowest you can..drag that window to the left side of the screen...
at this point you should have 2 windows open on your desktop..the flash drive on the right side..
go back to the folders on the C: drive...click on the documents and settings folder...then your user
name or all users..find the folders that has your data..
drag and drop the folder with the data you want to make copies of to the flash drive window...

your options are to move ..copy ect...JUST COPY..if its to big you will have to open the folder and
drag and drop individual files until the flash drive is full...(I have a 120 GB external USB drive for
big data recovery jobs and a 4 GB flash drive for the smaller jobs)..after you get the files copied to
the flash drive...
Click on the drives mounter you minimized earlier
UNMOUNT THE FLASH DRIVE by clicking on the green icon..you will once in awhile get error messages when
unmounting the drive..ignore them..when the flash drive icon turns red again its safe to remove the
flash drive..trot on over (stroll if you want to look cool) to another computer and plug in the flash

drive and copy all the data files ( I drag and drop) to the other computer..
make sure the other computer can read them...

now delete the data on the flash drive...take it back to the misbehaving computer and plug it in

again..click on the drives icon again and repeat until you have all your data transferred to the working
system..

thanks a bunch. got everything I wanted using puppy linux and a usb drive.

your welcome...