Acer Travelmate Laptop will not start
MACHINE DETAILS
Acer Travelmate (said to be 3 years old)
SOFTWARE INSTALLED
# Windows XP and Service Pack2
# Windows Office Professional
BACKGROUND
I bought a second hand Acer Travel Mate with Windows XP installed 2 days ago. I took a risk and bought it without the discs. It worked well and I have been using cable internet and playing music CDs without any problem. Today when I started to load a few Word small files it jammed while in Windows Explorer.
I did the Control Alt Delete. No response and then tried to turn it off. Nothing. Still jammed with the message displayed. The message that was displayed on the black screen I cannot remember but it eventually switched itself off after a few minutes.
Now on trying to restart it, it goes into a never ending loop as follows:
1. A black screen appears with a long message starting with:
"We apologize for the inconvenience but Windows did not start successfully. A new hardware or software change may have caused it. It then mentions the possibility of starting it in
# Safe Mode or
# Safe Mode with Network or
# Safe Mode with Command Prompt or
# Start Windows Normally
I tried all those modes but with no success. The situation that occurs then is:
2. After a few seconds it tries to start
3. The Windows XP logo blue screen appears and tries to start but stops and then-
4. A black screen appears and seems to go through a memory test. It is headed:
# BIOS V3.3 and below that
# Numbers changing quickly and beside that - KB Memory Good - at bottom of black screen it shows
# Bypass Memory Testing - press Esc key
5. It then tries to start again with the blue Windows XP logo page again appearing, but then goes thru stages 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 again and again until after a number of tries a black screen appears with:
# Insert system diskette and press key to reboot.
QUESTION
I do not have any discs. So have I done my money or is there some inexpensive way to fix the problem?
When I try to turn it off it comes up with a black screen with this message:
# BIOS V3.3
# 0253568 KB Memory Good
# IDE Primary Channel Master Drive Error
# Equipment Configuration Error
Press F2 to Enter Setup, F12 to enter Multi Boot Selection Menu
Press F2 to enter Setup Utility or F1 to continue
# ACRD5000-MIA-000016-RO1-AOB5-EM
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PLEASE HELP.