[fleamailman]

This case please understand will come under post mortum because I know that by the time someone answers it will have simply been converted to XP but that doesn't stop me wanting to know here if there was another more simple "less flog them something profitable" answer that I know is going to take up 1.5gb of their little hard disk. Please leave answering this post off until all the other live cases are cleared but I am sure that there are some people interested in this case as it would save the client at least the price of a new XP licence and sod the boss.

system is ME,
6Gb old piece of junk.

Problem: On start up after two or three error boxes it arrives at the last box in unreadable scrpt which is also unhittable(no advance from there) so I try boot in safemode where I get to the point of choice but after choosing "in safe mode" it continues for 20 seconds coming up with the same type of unreadable unhittatble box, story ends there.

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i lean towards corrupt active desktop....but I can't tell with so little information on the various error messages...plus, it would have to be totally messed up to impact safemode (if it could)

[gerryf]

i lean towards corrupt active desktop....but I can't tell with so little information on the various error messages...plus, it would have to be totally messed up to impact safemode (if it could)

[fleamailman]

Yes I know not the cause but I promise that both safe mode and normal modes came to a dead end. Thus this leaves only the bios with either a cd or a floppy to use but is there a program? I mean if this had been XP one just puts its cd and goes for repair, but what does one do with an older os like 98 or me.

Thanks.

[gerryf]

You do the same thing...we just don't call it that. Install Windows on top of itself--this is called a refresh. Make sure you install windows to THE SAME directory as before.

[fleamailman]

Thks for this reply, I will see if it's not too late, and if it isn't post back here the result but I fear that the boss has already prepaired a laundry bag for his client though next time I promise.

[admin]

If it's due to a corrupted registry hive, I've had good luck using this method:
http://support.micro...5&Product=winxp