[shell38]

My daughter is using xp on her pc im not sure if it is the home or professional editon. It came with her computer which was brought second hand, so we do not have a XP disc.

She was working quite happily and chatting on msn. Then the computer froze up so she pressed Contrl Alt Delete and it then came up with a black screen stating that start up was interupted sorry for any convience and it gave her choices of starting in normal, safe, and where settings were last working. Shel clicked on entre which wld of given the choice of normal start up, it started as if it was going to start it came up with the XP black screen with the coloured bar that runs bk and forth under XP. But then it went bk to the same screen.

We tried all the other options on that page, but every option including safe mode came back to that page. When i clicked on safe mode it started to run through with a list of drivers etc but wld not go into safe mode. So i turned pc off by holding turn off button and when i restarted the computer i pressed F8 until the full list of options came up and i tried them all but still it came back to that screen.

I am using my computer to post this. We r using wireless connection for the 2 upstairs computers, mine and the other computer are running fine so it cant be anything to do with that.

Please any help would be truly grateful as she uses her computer so much for her course work which is also stored on her hard drive, so its quite imortant we retrieve this information as well.

Once again for your kind help in taking trouble to read this

Shell

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Hi shell38...

Can you boot to Safe Mode with Command Prompt?

Restart your computer, and then press F8 during the initial startup to start your computer in "Safe Mode with a command prompt".

Type %systemroot%\system32\restore\rstrui.exe at the command prompt, and then press "Enter"...Follow the instructions that appear on the screen to restore your computer to an earlier state.

Let us know how you fare...

wannabe1

[wannabe1]

Hi shell38...

Can you boot to Safe Mode with Command Prompt?

Restart your computer, and then press F8 during the initial startup to start your computer in "Safe Mode with a command prompt".

Type %systemroot%\system32\restore\rstrui.exe at the command prompt, and then press "Enter"...Follow the instructions that appear on the screen to restore your computer to an earlier state.

Let us know how you fare...

wannabe1

[shell38]

Hi Wannabe

Thanx i will give this a try tomorrow as my daughter is now asleep, but i must admit i dont hold out much hope as i did try to do what u said by tapping F8 and it brought up the whole list of options including safe mode with prompt. but it just went bk to that page, im sure it did not even give me a chance to type anything in as i was gonna try run start like u can do in 98. But as i said will give it a try tomorrow and will get back to u.

Thank u so very very much for getting bk to me so quickly it really is nice to no there r some really caring people out there.

thanks Shell

[shell38]

Hi Wannabe1

Soz did not get bk to u yesterday only for some reason the site was down or playing about.

Right well i tried wat u said and as i thought it wld not let me do it. It normally comes up when u go into safte mode with promt a place for you to type in what u want to do. But as i thought it just did a long run of system, drivers etc. Then went straight bk to the same page. Even when i tab in F8 and get the whole list it still does this. No option seems to work.

I Am hoping to get the windows xp proff disk today from my brother, do u think by putting this in, it will help. Should i put the disk in as soon as i turn it on, or shld i wait till that page loads put the disk in and try starting in either normal or safe mode.

Many thanx for taking the trouble to reading this

Shell

[johnnygonefishin`]

I am having the exact same problem Xp pro only will get to the screen that says starting windows,no matter what choice I pick after hitting f8 systemdrivers scroll down the screen then blue screen says starting windows but goes no farther than that.

[Fenor]

Hey johnnygonefishin'!

Can you please start your own topic and describe exactly what is going on? We will then be able to help you. It's just too confusing to help two people in the same topic.

Thanks!

Fenor

[johnnygonefishin`]

sorry ok,I did

[shell38]

Hi

Well i have managed to get hold of a copy of xp proff. I have tried everything but it tries to boot up from cd but it says failure. and just goes bk to the option screen. The funny thing is it says that they appoligise for any inconvience that windows had to shut down.

One thing did happen when i clicked on the Disable automatic restart of system failure it came up with the following

A problem has been detected and window has shut down to prevent damage to computer.

Unmountable_boot_volume

The it goes on to say to check that new hardware and software has been installed or if there are any windows updates.

It also goes on to say if prob continues disable or remove hardware and any software. Disable BIOS memory options such as caching or shadowing.

This is all well and good but if i cant get into safe mode or anything like that im unsure on where to go from this.

I did read in your helpful hints about problems with xp start up and it does mention about 80pin rather than 40 pin. and that this cld be also linked to a virus. As the machine did not have any new hardware or software installed at the time of going wrong just froze and the outcome was not being able to restart pc porp

The last bit that i did get was
Technical information
*** STOP: 0x000000ED (0x81BDDBB8, 0xC0000006 0x00000000 0x000000000

As said i only recieved the above error when i used the Disable automatic restart of system failure from the advance section option on F8

The other thing i have also been given to try which i have not as yet is the Microsoft service pk 1 cd. Not sure if this is a good idea to try so i will wait to see what u think


As i said i have tried everything under my own knowledge but i am now stuck on ideas. So please if someone could plz get back to me as soon as possiable for my daughters sake (Course Work) i wld be most grateful.

Many thanks

Shell

[wannabe1]

Hi shell38...

Let's try using the recovery console...

I don't believe the XP Pro disk will work with the XP Home that seems to be installed on your daughter's machine. We'll need to determine what operating system is on the machine. Is this a branded computer (ie: HP, Dell, compaq...etc)? If so, what is the make and model number.

If you know which operating system is on there...XP SP1, XP SP2, etc...go HERE snd download the appropriate boot disk for that system. I would recommend using the 6 diskette floppy set...providing you have a floppy drive on both machines.

Once you have the bootdisk set made, post back and we'll get started....OR post back with the make and model information and we'll see if we can determine which operating system is present.

wannabe1

[shell38]

Hi

Well i think this might be abit of a tough one. We brought the computer second hand from a guy out the paper. He seemed to no what he was doing. He says he was always fixing servicing computers as part of his job and does them up and sells them on. So i believe he must of installed the xp himself we had no disk with the computer.

Make and model all i can tell you bout this computer is that it is a desktop unit and all it says is DAN i can not find a model number anywhere i have checked the bk and everywhere i can think of.

It deff has xp and the reason why i now believe it to be the proff edition is when i tried some of the options to start the machine in advance options (F8) it asked me to choose the program i wish to run and the only option it was giving me was XP proffesional.

As for downloading the programe u have asked me to do. I can do that but the only problem i have is that u recommend using 6 floppy disks. Unfortunatly i only have cd drives on this computer no floppy. So do i save it onto a whole disk or will it ask me to put in 6. I dont mind doing this if this is what it takes to get my daughters computer up and running again.
So could u please explain wat to do as i have no floppy.

Many thanx
Shell

[wannabe1]

shell38...

I'm betting that you do not have the Product Key for the installation of Windows XP on this machine...we'lll have to get it running to pull it out of the registry.

Start the machine with the Windows XP Pro cd in the cd-rom drive.

When the Welcome to Setup screen appears, press R to select the repair option...If you have a dual-boot or multiple-boot computer, select the Windows installation that you want to access from the Recovery Console (Windows XP Pro).

Type the administrator password when you are prompted to do so. NOTE: If no administrator password exists, press "Enter".

At the command prompt, on the drive where Windows is installed, type chkdsk /r (Note the space before /r), and then press "Enter". This will run on bootup...be patient.

At the command prompt, type exit, and then press "Enter" to restart your computer.

If this procedure does not work, repeat it and use the fixboot command instead of the chkdsk /r command.

Let me know how you fare...

wannabe1

[shell38]

hi

I have tried inserting the disk but it will not let me do anthing just keeps going bk to the same old screen. I cant get on the repair bit or nothing.....

Does this look like the end of the life for the old thing

thanx
Shell

[wannabe1]

Let's not give up quite yet...

Sounds like we need to set the cd-rom as first boot device in BIOS. This will probably be a little confusing, but because every BIOS version is a lttle different, I can only help a little with this. To enter BIOS setup, power on the machine and tap the either the F1, f2, or Delete key during the boot sequence. If you look at the bottom of the first screen displayed, it should say "Press [key] to enter setup".

Once in BIOS setup, you'll need to find "Boot Order" or "Boot Priority". To navigate in BIOS settings, use the arrow keys...to change values, use the + and - keys...to move between screens, press Esc...Press enter to select or initiate a change.

When you find the Boot Priority, change it so the cd-rom is listed as first boot device. SAVE the settings (usually F10, but may be different on your machine...you may have to look for the cammand key on the bottom of the screen) and exit BIOS setup.

Now try restarting the machine with the XP Pro disk in the drive and access the Recovery Console as described in my earlier post.

wannabe1

[shell38]

Hi

Well there is some good and bad news.
Good news!
First of all i managed to locate how to get into the BIOS set up, i used the delete key to get the screen up with the following options.

Standard CMOS Feature
Speedeasy CPU setup
Advanced BIOS features
Power Management set up
PnP/PCI configurations
Intergrated Peripheral
PC Health Status
Load fail Safe Defaults
Set supervisor password
Set user Password
Save + Exit set up
Exit without saving

So I went into the Advanced BIOS Features

This is wat the settings were

QDI Booteasy Feature - Enabled
Chipaway Virus on Guard - Enabled
CPU Internal Cache - Enabled
External Cache - Enabled
CPU L2 Cache ECC Checking -Enabled
Processor Number feature - Enabled
Qucik Power on self test - Enabled
First Boot Device - CD ROM
Second Boot Device - HDD-0
Third Boot Device - Disabled
Boot other device - Enabled
Swop Floppy Drive - Disabled
Boot up Numlock -on
Gate A20 option - Normal
Security option - Set Up
OS Select for Dram > 64mb -NON-052 (os2 not sure if it was numbers of letters)
HDD S.M.A.R.T Capability - Enabled
Viedo BIOS Shadow - Enabled
C8000 - CBFFF Shadow - Disabled
CC000 - CFFFF Shadow - Disabled
D0000 -D3FFF Shadow -Disabled
D4000 - D7FFF Shadow - Disabled
D8000 - DBFFF Shadow - Disabled
DC000 - DFFFF Shadow - Disabled
Delay for HDD (secs) - 0
Show Boot Logo - Disabled
Flash Write Protect - Enabled


Well as i then went into the First Boot Device even though it already said CD Rom i went in again and made sure it was on that and pressed F10 to save. It came up with i think save CMOS and i put Y and pressed enter.

I then tried the disk for xp. This is the bad news nothing different happened. Could it be that it is because this is not the disk it was loaded with as i have borrowed this disk from my brother as the computer did not come with a XP disk.

Or did i not go into the correct bit.

Thanx for your patience with me

Shell

[wannabe1]

shell38...

The CD you have should work. It looks as though your cd-rom drive is already selected as first boot device...that's good.

Restart the machine with the disk in the drive, and on the first screen there should be a prompt at the bottom to "Press any key to boot from cd"...press a key....(Is this, perhaps, a step we missed?).

wannabe1