[lizgold]

First, thanks for being there!!!!

I have an eMachines running XP Media Center Edition 2005 that won't boot. I have tried all my boot CDs. At first the Ultimate Boot CD at least loaded the BIOS, but then it said that the boot failed with the following error:

isolinux: Disk error 80, AX=4200, drive 9F

Now even that won't boot, nor will the eMachines Windows XP disk.

It's an eMachines H6524 with an AMD Athlon 64 processor.

Recently it tried to download and install XP SP3 without success. When I started up, Windows Updater said it would remove the SP3 and restore the machine after reboot. It copied all the files back over, then restarted. I could not boot. I then used my Norton Internet Security 2008 disk to boot, and it asked whether to boot from CD or hard drive. I chose "hard drive" and it booted up fine. I got a message saying Windows Update had updated my computer. The computer worked fine then. But when I restarted, it wouldn't boot up at all.

I understand there is some sort of problem with SP3 and AMD processors, but I can't perform any kind of fix 'cause I can't boot. I'm on auto-update and I have done all the intermediate updates, so I understand that SP3 really isn't necessary. (I don't know why it's only now trying to do this update.)

I had also recently made some changes to my Norton Ghost configuration which froze the computer at one point.

I do have a full backup on an external drive (or at least I hope I do).

I am using my old computer, so I do have the option of swapping out the second hard drive in case I need to do something to the one that's not working. But I need for someone to tell me how/what to do.

I desperately need the other computer 'cause it has all my critical work files, and this one runs like a fly in honey.

Thanks!!!

Edited by lizgold, 23 October 2008 - 04:43 PM.

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Check your cables and possibly try a new CD drive. Sounds like a faulty drive or faulty disks.

[Gnomad1600]

Check your cables and possibly try a new CD drive. Sounds like a faulty drive or faulty disks.

[lizgold]

OK, I feel dumb. Spent an hour with a Windows tech (they have free support for XP SP3 problems) before finally realizing that my partner had her iPod plugged in. Unplugged it and the computer restarted, no problem. Weird.

Now I can try one of the workarounds for either getting SP3 to install or stop Windows Update from trying to install it.

Hope this helps some other poor soul....