[pete9288]

I am trying to start my computer and it does the following-boots to 8500 gt screen then goes to m2ne-sli boot screen giving option to press delete to enter bios or tab to post screen. It then has a black screen with cursor blinking in top left. It then goes black and nothing happens. I have tried pressing f8 but it goes to boot menu for boot devices. I have tried booting from my windows XP cd but it goes to press any key to boot from cd, then says checking system configuration, then nothing. Please help i am at my wits end!!

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Have you actually been into the BIOS to check everything is fine there?

[Storman]

Have you actually been into the BIOS to check everything is fine there?

[pete9288]

checked bios and everything seems fine. recognises hard drive and cd drives. Changed boot sequence but no change

[Storman]

How old is the Hard Drive ?

I'm wondering if you should run a utility from your hard drive manufacturer to check it for fauls/errors. It might be on the way out?

Do you know the make/model of the drive?

[happyrock]

you could also 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...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 your data to cd/dvds or 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...

[pete9288]

i cant run the computer to check the harddrive so im not sure if hdd utility software is an option

[pete9288]

the hard drive is a western digital caviar wd1200 its nearly five yrs old

[happyrock]

puppy linux does not need a hard drive to run...if the rest of your system is ok it will run...

[Storman]

At five years old it may well be on it's way out

If you can, download this utility from Western Digital. It runs in DOS and works from a floppy drive. The instructions and download link are below. It will check your drive for errors. If it's OK after running the utility then at least you can look elsewhere to determine the cause. These utilities usually have DOS built in so you don't need to worry about that.

Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for DOS (Floppy)

[Ztruker]

A suggestion, instead of pressing F8 at boot to get to the Windows Advanced Options Menu, try F5. Some BIOS manufacturers usurp F8. Also, holding down the Ctrl key sometimes works for this.

[Gl@dius]

hehe. my family has some hard drives that are 7-10 years old. I guess we got lucky.

sorry about your trouble man.

[pete9288]

hard drive is fragged. bought sata drive and i am now having problems applying windows updates-will not go past windows xp screen on boot up just lags there. any ideas??

[Ztruker]

Pete, have you installed the SATA drivers?

[pete9288]

i have just created a sata driver disc but pressing f6 does nothing on install

[pete9288]

just installed the sata drivers well it says raid but i assume its the same thing. It is installing windows as i type. It has done this previously without the sata drivers but then i encountered problems after updating windows from windows update. i will try this again now and see what happens lol!!!! im keeping my fingers crosses as i have been at the comp for over 12 hrs now lol!