I have a 4 year old system with the following configuration:
P4 1.6GHz, 512MB 133MHz SDRAM on VIA P4M266 motherboard running Windows 98 SE on one partition and WinXP SP2 on other.
Today morining i was checking my mails and suddenly got the usual winXP error message in Firefox and it asked to close the application. So i clicked dont send error report and closed the application. Tried starting Firefox again, but got the same problem repeatedly. I thought something is wrong with Firefox so tried opening IE. To my surprise it too didnt start and displayed the same error message. Without checking if other applications were working fine, i restarted the machine. While shutting down a message said there was problem with a file "Wault/d.xxx" i didnt really care bout it cause i didnt know the severity at that time.
When the computer finally shut down it would reboot and go till the Windows XP splash screen and reboot again. This loop just didnt stop no matter what i do. I tried booting in safe mode, last known good configuration etc. etc. But it didnt help. I cannot even reach the logon screen. So next i tried starting Win98, but that too would'nt load and comes to a screen with message "Windows protection error detected, please restart your computer".
I am amazed how both operating systems in perfect working condition can go bad simultaneously? What should i do?
I have a DSL connection and had kept the computer on overnight for downloading a movie. I have Avast AV installed. I dont think its a virus cause i was downloading an AVI file.
Please advice.
Thanks,
Kapil