I installed Windows XP Pro over my Windows XP home a few days ago. My Windows XP Pro seemed to be working fine except it didn't feel or acknowledge my built in speakers and various other hardware. My dad said this might stem from the fact that the Windows I have (being from 2001) is older than my laptop. He suggested I DL the service pack onto on desktop computer, put it on a disk and open it on my laptop and install. I did that, and everything seemed to go fine until I restarted my PC as I usually do when I install new software. My laptop told there had a been a error that Windows was failing to boot properly due to some failed installation of software or failed hardware installation. It had a few options like "start with the last known configuration of windows that worked on your computer" so I did that. And I tried the other options too. But after a few screens of the usual booting up stuff my laptop just goes to a black screen and I can't get away from it. Windows Support won't help me so I'm asking you guys.
hope someone can help me! I have windows XP and a while ago IE stopped being able to download, i have resolved that by reinstalling IE, however about the same time my windows update installations were failing and i thought it was because of my download problem in IE however now IE is fixed but i still cannot install windows updates.Before anyone tells me to go into tools, options, security blah blah, i have done that already but it has not resolved the problem. The error message i get is just a box that says updates were unable to be successfully installed then a list of the updates it was unable to install, but no reason for the error or number is given.
I am running Windows XP (SP2) on an eMachines T2080 desktop. All Windows security patches and other OS updates are current. McAfee virus scan is run weekly, as is SpyBot S&D and AVG/Ewido. I am running a GeForce FX 5200 graphics card with up-to-date drivers
The problem is, while using this computer, i had a hung-up process that was slowing things down. After doing CNTL-ALT-DEL to see the process list, i accidentally shut down the explorer process, thinking it was a hung-up internet explorer. Naturally, the computer shut down, but ever since, it does not seem to want to boot appropriately. From a cold power-up, it will go through the "Windows" logo screen with the blue scrolling bar for about 10 seconds, then the screen goes black and stays black for about a minute. Rather than coming to the light blue screen where the user-id's live, the system instantaneously flashes a "blue screen" (with some white characters on the screen), however, it's so fast that I can't read it, nor can I get a screen shot of it. Once that blue screen flashes, it goes back and tries to boot again, only it gives me the options of safe mode, start windows normally, start from last known good configuration, etc. I can boot up just fine in safe mode, but the blue screen phenomenon happens for all the other options. I have tried a system restore to a previous day, and that doesn't work either.
any ideas on how to proceed, short of an OS reinstall / repair. I have seen some suggestions for CMOS battery replacement,I can copy any utility files I need just fine while in safe mode, but I'd like to try and do additional troubleshooting
I installed XP x64 (Yes, I know, that was a mistake) on my machine a while ago and was tired of having to put up with all the incompatibility issues that had been arising, whether it was not having iTunes work properly to even some of my favorite software just not loading and prompting me with error messages.
I've got an HP / Compaq notebook where the smart diags indicated a failing hard drive, HP shipped me a replacement drive under warranty and I removed the drive and used a couple of notebook hard drive adapters to hook them up as master and slave on the secondary channel of one of my desktops. I then used Ghost to clone the failing drive to the replacement since I really didn't want to have to reinstall all my applications again. The clone completed without any seeming problems however I haven't been able to get the new drive to boot up, the problem is that I just get a blank screen with a flashing cursor and no boot menu, end of story...
I happen to have a Win XP Pro full version CD and I am able to boot from the CD to the recovery console, I've tried the following: Chkdsk /R - Did find and fix some problem the first time around, but didn't find anything wrong on subsequent runs. Fixboot - ran with no problems but still no go. FixMbr - indicated "This computer appears to have a non-standard or invalid master boot record", no matter how many times I've run this and it says it's rewritten the MBR successfully it still says the same thing. In-place upgrade - I've run an in-place upgrade twice and both times it completes and says the system will reboot and the installation will continue but it still gets stuck on the reboot. Following the two in-place upgrades I've rerun all of the previous steps and I still can't get it to boot, nor do I get any type of error message that indicates what the problem is.
First I attempted to install Win XP Home from a cdrom to my C partition (20 gigs, partitioned from either my 120 or 160 gig (forget which) hard drive). However it kept botching up and giving me messages about files not copying properly or being corrupted etc. I cycled through a variety of XP install cds (son's, wife's, etc) without any luck. I tried using either the CDRW or DVD drive, in case one might have been faulty...no luck, however.I figured all of this business probably gunked up the works on my C partition, so I thought I'd better format it and wipe it clean, which I did using a Win98 SE boot CD and loading FDISK. I wanted to partition the 20 gig into 2 x 10 gig so that I could limit the C partition to pretty much only Win XP. Silly me...! Turned out I made a 2 MB partition with the remainder of the partition seemingly unavailable to me...couldn't see it when attempting to view partition information.
how would you determine if you're MBR is corrupted? Here is the situation: The user boots up his Windows XP Pro SP2 machine, it does the normal POST and gets to the splash screen, however, it seems after that it will display a standard "Microsoft Apologizes but Windows did not boot properly... please select from one of the options..."
When this comes up, we attempt to launch windows into Safe Mode. It runs displays the some messages (more on the lines of what seems to be in the autoexec.bat file) but suddenly the PC reboots. It does the POST again and then the splash screen then bam same message as above. So we try the Last Known Good Configuration option but it does the same thing. Reboots the PC and gets to that screen.
I have a Gateway laptop that won't boot up properly. Sometimes it will go to the Windows screen that has the bar at the bottom like it is loading and then it will just restart. But here lately it has been just going to the screen that asks if you want to start in safe mode and all the other choices. But it just locks up and won't go from there. I think that my hard drive is messed up. I just ordered a new hdd. Can I just change the hdd to fix it or is it something else?
i have a computer that i recently installed windows xp on. I shut the computer down for the first time after installing windows that was all good but then when i started it up the next morning it wouldn't work.it gets half way through loading windows then flashes blue and restarts.after it restarts it gives me the screen were it says:start windows normally start windows safe mode etc it will start in safe mode then i can start it normally after restarting it but i would like it just to boot up the first time
I have a problem with my XP Pro, I can never get past the boot screen (the one with the XP Pro logo and has loading), it would try to load but would never happen. So I tried rebooting in safe mode and it works, I scanned my HD with AVG, Adware, Norton and Spybot. On several of them I found ISTBar and DYFUCA on my computer. So I deleted them with my program, then I deleted all my temporary files, in C:windows emp C:document and settingsuserlocal settings emp and internet temporary files including offline files. Then turned off system restore, and rebooted. It worked however today when booted up XP again same boot screen problem. Can you tell me how to fix this problem?
I want to repair my windows cause I doesn't boot up properly..I hve followed instructions but when I put cd in it takes mr to set up windows n asking mr to select partition..so I select my current system drive n it is asking mr to press c to continue setup using this partition..N then it ask me to format or leave current file system intact..am I doing something wrong, how come I don't have the repair windows xp option like it shows on the user guide?
My windows xp doesnt want to boot up properly now. I am in safe mode and it is really annoying. I had was when i heard one computer beep while i was on the internet. I was like WTF m8. and i thought it was just a glitch. But an hour later i was writing an e-mail and the computer just locked up
I reset my computer, first attempt it crashed on the windows xp loading screen in dos and 2nd time it loads up to windows but then the monitor tells me that it isnt recieving any signal from the computer. I know it hasnt booted upproperly cause iw ould be able to hear the boot up sound and plus my computer is quite slow so i would hear the hardr drive running.
Last night Windows automatically began to install updates as I was logging off. By the time I realised, I had turned the power supply off the computer had therefore not shut down properly.Tried to swith on today and I get a "Windows did not start successfuly message" with a range of options including safe mode, safe mode with networking, safe mode with command prompt, last known good configuration or start normally. No matter which one I choose, it gets as far as the XP loading screen then reverts back to the "Windows did not start successfully" screen.I therefore did the F8 after the Bios which took me to the advanced options menu. I disabled the auto restart and I get an error Unmountable Boot Volume - error code 0x000000ED.
I am having probllems installing Windows XP, first of all the installation is unusually slow, it has more than 5 hours installing. Then i have a boot error from Windows NOT from the BIOS, i have tried getting into the Repair Console an using FIXMBR and FIXBOOT, unsuccesfully; removed every suspecious setting on my BIOS..... The installator copies small parts, copy 1% or 2% and stops for a while (I think it is decompressing the files, but that slow!?). After that i get a booting error (I dont remember what does it says; i will post it later, when my 4th attemp ends).
Today when I started the computer it would not boot up properly and I got the message that "Dr Watson postmortem debugger" encountered a problem and it needed to close. The computer never booted up properly and the desktop would constantly disappear. is this a virus? Also what is Dr Watson debugger,I never heard of it before. I am running my virus software to see if it is a virus.
I have 2 internal SATA disks and one external USB 2.0 drive. I had XP SP 2 running just fine, but I decided to give Vista RTM a try, so I installed Vista RTM on the first SATA drive (receated the partition).All drives have NTFS file systems.Since Nvidia does not have a decent Vista driver yet, I decided to do a XP installation on the 2nd SATA drive, just for when I want to play a game. And here is my problem:When booting of the XP SP2 CD, I can only see the USB drive available for the install, all the SATA drives are shown as "Unknown Disk" (No disk present).
I had a missing "Windowssystem32configsystem" upon restarting my comp last Saturday. Couldn't boot into safe mode at all. Used HP's recovery console to run chkdsk and it fix errors on the volume. Wouldn't let me run the recovery disks I had to get from HP since they are not given with a new computer. Great I thought.Upon starting now, my antivirus won't run and a lot of Windows programs(Search adn System Restore just a blank page, Media Player, etc) .I can get IE to open up but no active X although it says it is enabled, also my home page doesn't show up at all but it is set to it. Those are some of the things I have found wrong so far as I am sure I have more.
I've read similar posts on this subject on the net and on techguy, but I've never found anything that seems to work.I have a Gateway computer running MS XP media center edition Operating system purchased sometime around the summer of 05.It had been running perfectly fine, well, almost perfectly fine, until just recently it decided that it did not want to start up. At first it was internittant and could be solved by turning the computer on and off along with playing with the powerstrip, now these methods have failed tend the computer refuses to boot up at all
just recently i did somthing to my computer i have no clue wat the computer than started to come up with this intel this n says error 111 down the bottom...press F4 thing.i press F4 n it goes to bios setup utility..than i usually just press escape n enter[ok] and at the moment it goes to the black screen where u choose wat to use..eg start windows normally, safe mode, safe mode with networking. i use the last known working configuration n the loading windows black screen comes up n my computer than restarts...can someone please tell me how to fix this. i feel like throwing my computer out the window! its 1 1/2 yr old
2.2 GHz Athlon 64 512 MB DDR2 Windows XP Media Center Last night, the right-click function on my optical mouse starting acting up, wouldn't work unless I pressed hard. As I was furiously right-clicking on the desktop to get it to work, all of the text backgrounds on the desktop icons turned from invisible to black. Oops, no problem, I thought, I'll restart and it'll return to normal. Nope. So I right-clicked (replaced the mouse with a PS2 model, works fine now) on the desktop, went to the Desktop tab, Customize, Web, and unchecked "Lock desktop items". The icons looked fine after that. More weirdness followed: when I went into hibernation, no problems (it stated "preparing to hibernate", etc.). But touch the mouse, and it returns to life as if in standby mode. All the power settings are normal for using hibernation. Please don't tell me to not use hibernation, I've always used it with no problems. No new or weird processes running in the background. What on earth could my idiotic right-clicking have done to my settings to result in these two problems? Oh yeah, I did update Windows a few hours before this, but the hibernate feature definitely worked prior to my problem. I'd hate to have to restore to the previous restore point since I'm on dialup and I hate updating Windows manually.
I am running Windows XP Home Edition on a Compaq/Presario desktop. The XP was pre-installed and so I have no boot disks. I hope I never need it, but just as a precaution, I made a Boot disk using a freeware program "PE Builder". The process seemed to go ok, but there was a warning that "building from an OEM version of Windows can mean trouble..."
I am trying to install a second copy of XP Pro on my system. I have the first installation on my first hard disc which is partition C: . I have another hard disc which has two partitions D: and Z:. D: has my data and Z: (20gb) is going to be for testing programs and settings and such without installing them on my main disc.
I loaded my XP Pro CD into the optical drive and went through the menus to install a new OS on partition Z. I did a quick format of partition Z in NTFS format. Installation proceeded and the computer rebooted just like usual. Then as it got to the preparing windows installation screen it froze. Just stopped. I restarted and it tried to resume but would freeze immediately again. I checked the boot.ini file and it is just like it should be. With both OS listed. I tried doing this three times and I got the same results each time. My original OS still works fine. I am considering completely reformating the partition and removing all traces of the installatiuon from the boot.ini file but if anyone has any other ideas that are easier I would like to know.
I have never had a sound problem on my computer until very recently. I can restore it back and the sound is restored. However, every morning, the sound is "gone". I then restore it back to Sept. 14, and the sound returns. I use the "automatic update" feature. Last night after I restored back to 9/14, I changed the option to "notify me of updates". So far, this morning, I still have sound. Is it possible that one of the automatic updates is causing this problem. Or do you have any suggestions as to what may be causing it. By sound, I am just taking about the sound you hear when you reboot or play online games not the cd room
Hey, I just reinstalled Windows XP Pro SP2 (I've done like a hundred times before). After Installing my WiFi I install Norton 360, theni fully update my PC with Microsoft Update. This meant Downloading Service Pack 3. I've had Service Pack 3 on the same PC before. Whenever I try to install updates now they all totally fail with no error codes, and Winodws Live Installer fails all its installations. I manage to be able to install .exe applcations fine. but its bugging me not to be able to instal MSN
everytime i shut down my comp, when i turn it on again i get an error message that says 'insert boot disk' on the startup screen. i'm not sure what the exact message was, but it was something about boot disk i should have written it down anyway, i turned the comp off, and shook the CPU a bit and then tried again and it started. I did a virus scan and every things clear l. i don't know much about these things lol so doing the virus scan must sound a little silly.so then anyway, i had to turn the computer off again and then when i switched it on i got the same error message. i pushed the off button and then put it on again and it worked. how do i prevent getting the error?
Firstly I have a pc which I installed Win XP Prof onto. All worked great. Then took out modem card and replaced with ethernet card. Again no problem. However, when I went to boot the compute up a week or so later it went through the boot process and then just before I would expect to see the Windows logo with blue sky background appear I "sometimes" get a blue screen flash up with a message which you cant read unless you can slow down time and then the PC restarts and goes through the whole procedure again. I did manage to start in Boot logging mode and watch to see where the problem was. It seemed to be something to do with the Display adaptor. I found the appropriate solution on the web and although I now get further on into the boot, it still restarts. When i try to run the logging thing (!) it does not want to play any more and just boots in the normal fashion. I have tried defaulting the BIOS, checking the file system for damaged sectors etc all to no avail.
The moment I loged in and reboot. I bumped into the unbootable stage again. However, this time the repair feature did not work and I ended up having to do a re-install. So now I'm stuck with this:I've tried running eveysingle usable option in the repair window but none worked. I've even tried replacing the BOOTMGR via CMD in the repair window with the Windows Vista Disc but still nothing.And whenever I try to do the install, once it gets to the last step. It tells me something like this:"Cannot move onto next steop, issue doing the install blah blah blah. Windows will not restart something something."
This pc is normally running on windows xppro sp2. when i tried to upgrade to winxp sp3, the pc works well on the initial installation procedure. But after the first reboot during installation process,it won't go through the windows environment, but instead repeats what it started.But if I try to take out the installation disk of windows, it seems that it was not installed with windows.No system files being copied.
I installed a Light Scribe CD/DVD RW Optical Drive on my Alienware computer. When I booted it up, it took about 7 minutes to complete. Normally it takes about one minute. Does anyone know why it now takes so long for my computer to boot up?
My computer has automatically tried to install it over 30 times now, and i tried manually about 5 times, and everytime it just fails, and doesn't complete! PLEASE HELP!
I copied/cloned my failing C: to a drive on USB. C: drive has now failed and I need the copy to become bootable. Why can't this question be a simple answer. What happened to fdisk utilities?