[windowsxpuser]

hello,

I've found this site via a search engine. I have read topics here that seem similar, but they don't seem to help me.

My problem: when I start the computer, it shows a black screen and a blinking cursor. (before loading wxp)

My pc worked fine until I tried to re-install windows.
The setup said: press F3 to quit. I did, to go back to my old install, to check some things.
But after a restart, it showed a black screen with blinking cursor.

I tried a wxp setup by booting from cd and formatted the harddisk.
The setup restarted the pc after copying files from cd, but it only shows a black screen with black cursor.

I tried repair previous windows install, but it brought me to a dos-screen.
There I tried format C:. After it was done, I tried a setup from the cd again: same problem.

Edit: after a 3rd re-install, the computer now is stuck in the following loop:
- turn on pc
- error message that is on screen for about 0,5 seconds, saying something about error loading boot.ini.
- automatic restart

Edited by windowsxpuser, 27 February 2011 - 05:11 PM.

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If you have Windows CD...

1. Insert your Windows XP CD into your CD and assure that your CD-ROM drive is capable of booting the CD.
2. Once you have booted from CD, do NOT select the option that states: Press F2 to initiate the Automated System Recovery (ASR) tool.
You’re going to proceed until you see the following screen, at which point you will press the “R” key to enter the recovery console:



3. After you have selected the appropriate option from step two, you will be prompted to select a valid Windows installation (typically number “1").
Select the installation number, and hit Enter.
If there is an administrator password for the administrator account, enter it and hit Enter (if asked for the password, and you don't know it, you're out of luck).
You will be greeted with this screen, which indicates a recovery console at the ready:



4. There are eight commands you must enter in sequence to repair any of the issues I noted in the opening of this guide.
I will introduce them here, and then show the results graphically in the next six steps.
NOTE. Make sure, you press Enter after each command. Make sure, all commands are exact, including "spaces".
These commands are as follows:

CD..
ATTRIB -H C:\boot.ini
ATTRIB -S C:\boot.ini
ATTRIB -R C:\boot.ini
del boot.ini
BOOTCFG /Rebuild

Note about the above command.
BOOTCFG /REBUILD command which searches for pre-existing installations of Windows XP and rebuilds sundry essential components of the Windows operating system, recompiles the BOOT.INI file and corrects a litany of common Windows errors.
It is very important that you do one or both of the following two things:
A.) Every Windows XP owner must use /FASTDETECT as OS Load Option when the rebuild process is finalizing.
B.) If you are the owner of a CPU featuring Intel’s XD or AMD’s NX buffer overflow protection, you must also use /NOEXECUTE=OPTIN as an OS Load Option.
For the Enter Load Identifier portion of this command, you should enter the name of the operating system you have installed.
If, for example, you are using Windows XP Home, you could type Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition for the identifier (it's not crucial, however what the name is, as long, as it's meaningful).
Here is your computer screen:



5. Following command verifies the integrity of the hard drive containing the Windows XP installation. While this step is not an essential function in our process, it’s still good to be sure that the drive is physically capable of running windows, in that it contains no bad sectors or other corruptions that might be the culprit:

CHKDSK /R

6. This last command writes a new boot sector to the hard drive and cleans up all the loose ends we created by rebuilding the BOOT.INI file and the system files. When the Windows Recovery Console asks you if you are Sure you want to write a new bootsector to the partition C: ? just hit “Y”, then Enter to confirm your decision:

FIXBOOT

7. It’s time to reboot your PC by typing
EXIT
and pressing Enter.

With any luck, your PC will boot successfully into Windows XP as if your various DLL, Hive, EXE and NTLDR errors never existed.



2. If you don't have Windows CD...
Download Windows Recovery Console: http://www.thecomput...om/files/rc.iso
Download, and install free Imgburn: http://www.imgburn.c...hp?act=download
Using Imgburn, burn rc.iso to a CD.
Boot to the CD...let it finish loading.
When the "Welcome to Setup" screen appears, press R to start the Recovery Console.
Then, follow instructions from Step #3 above.

Thanks To Broni For The Instructions

[rshaffer61]

If you have Windows CD...

1. Insert your Windows XP CD into your CD and assure that your CD-ROM drive is capable of booting the CD.
2. Once you have booted from CD, do NOT select the option that states: Press F2 to initiate the Automated System Recovery (ASR) tool.
You’re going to proceed until you see the following screen, at which point you will press the “R” key to enter the recovery console:



3. After you have selected the appropriate option from step two, you will be prompted to select a valid Windows installation (typically number “1").
Select the installation number, and hit Enter.
If there is an administrator password for the administrator account, enter it and hit Enter (if asked for the password, and you don't know it, you're out of luck).
You will be greeted with this screen, which indicates a recovery console at the ready:



4. There are eight commands you must enter in sequence to repair any of the issues I noted in the opening of this guide.
I will introduce them here, and then show the results graphically in the next six steps.
NOTE. Make sure, you press Enter after each command. Make sure, all commands are exact, including "spaces".
These commands are as follows:

CD..
ATTRIB -H C:\boot.ini
ATTRIB -S C:\boot.ini
ATTRIB -R C:\boot.ini
del boot.ini
BOOTCFG /Rebuild

Note about the above command.
BOOTCFG /REBUILD command which searches for pre-existing installations of Windows XP and rebuilds sundry essential components of the Windows operating system, recompiles the BOOT.INI file and corrects a litany of common Windows errors.
It is very important that you do one or both of the following two things:
A.) Every Windows XP owner must use /FASTDETECT as OS Load Option when the rebuild process is finalizing.
B.) If you are the owner of a CPU featuring Intel’s XD or AMD’s NX buffer overflow protection, you must also use /NOEXECUTE=OPTIN as an OS Load Option.
For the Enter Load Identifier portion of this command, you should enter the name of the operating system you have installed.
If, for example, you are using Windows XP Home, you could type Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition for the identifier (it's not crucial, however what the name is, as long, as it's meaningful).
Here is your computer screen:



5. Following command verifies the integrity of the hard drive containing the Windows XP installation. While this step is not an essential function in our process, it’s still good to be sure that the drive is physically capable of running windows, in that it contains no bad sectors or other corruptions that might be the culprit:

CHKDSK /R

6. This last command writes a new boot sector to the hard drive and cleans up all the loose ends we created by rebuilding the BOOT.INI file and the system files. When the Windows Recovery Console asks you if you are Sure you want to write a new bootsector to the partition C: ? just hit “Y”, then Enter to confirm your decision:

FIXBOOT

7. It’s time to reboot your PC by typing
EXIT
and pressing Enter.

With any luck, your PC will boot successfully into Windows XP as if your various DLL, Hive, EXE and NTLDR errors never existed.



2. If you don't have Windows CD...
Download Windows Recovery Console: http://www.thecomput...om/files/rc.iso
Download, and install free Imgburn: http://www.imgburn.c...hp?act=download
Using Imgburn, burn rc.iso to a CD.
Boot to the CD...let it finish loading.
When the "Welcome to Setup" screen appears, press R to start the Recovery Console.
Then, follow instructions from Step #3 above.

Thanks To Broni For The Instructions

[windowsxpuser]

Thanks, I'll try this and post the result here.

[windowsxpuser]

One thing that didn't work was "cd..", but I could execute the del-command by ending it with c:\boot.ini.
I also did not use the "EXIT", but restarted the computer myself.
Aside from this, I followed every step.

After restarting it didn't load windows. It shouldn't, I think, because I formatted before.
So I tried installing wxp from the setup cd again, but after formatting (which the wxp setup does), it only shows a blinking cursor.

Edited by windowsxpuser, 28 February 2011 - 04:52 PM.

[rshaffer61]

So you have formatted the system now?
Did you then do a fresh install?

[windowsxpuser]

So you have formatted the system now?
Did you then do a fresh install?

Yes correct. Or at least: I start the wxp setup and its install, but somewhere in the process (after formatting, copying files from cd and restarting the pc) it gets to the black screen with blinking cursor again.

[rshaffer61]

OK are these the steps you are taking?

Go HERE for step by step instructions on how to partition, format, and install XP fresh


http://lifehacker.co...atch-157578.php

[windowsxpuser]

I followed these steps yes, but I tried something different now: delete the C-partition (it was the only one) and create a C partition. (before I did not delete or create any partition, because there was only 1 and it was already formatted)
Now the setup of Windows seems to be working.

Thanks for the advice.

[rshaffer61]

Depending on the issue the partition table may have been doinked along the way and by deleting it and resetting it up the issue should now resolve itself. Let me know how the reinstall goes now.

[windowsxpuser]

Windows xp is re-installed. Now I only have to search all drivers and I can start receiving Windows-updates.
Thanks again.

[rshaffer61]

What drivers are you needing and if you give me the make and model of the system if it is a brand name or the make and model of the mobo.... I can assist in finding the original drivers for you.