XP Home Edition won't boot to desktop

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'Peachest2

HELP! Over 2.5 weeks ago, my computer stopped booting to the desktop. No
icons, nothing shows...but 3 screens. One screen is the Microsoft XP logo,
one is "shut off mode in 5 seconds" and there is another one with white
writing....somethiing File. When I ca lled this Microsoft help place, they
told me to turn my computer off and keep pressing F8 over and over. We tried
to reboot with the safe mode, and all this other options on that list.
Nothing. They said it sounds like my version of XP is corrupted. Finally,
they said that I need to get the XP Home Edition disc and re-install it.
Well, my computer is 6 years old abd Sony Vaio doesn't give you the disc when
you buy it. They said that I would be able to reinstall XP Home Edition
WITHOUT losing any of my data.

So, I had to buy the XP Home Edition. I bought it from an E-Bay seller. He
sent the Pro edition, so I had to return it because it said I would lose my
data if I installed it. I was assured by these Microsoft techs if I bought
the same edition (XP Home Edition) I would not lose my data. It wouldn't try
to "reformat" the drive.

Well, this afternoon I just go the XP Home Edition in the mail, put it in,
and it says that C drive either has something incompatible with XP, hasn't
been formatted, etc. etc. It won't let me install on D drive. But, it says if
installed it will need to format the drive and CAUTION ALL data will be
lost.!!!

Is there any way to re-install without it losing my data? I think most of
my important data is on D but I know some is still on C too. I'm about to
self-combust :-)

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
Your system will need to be reloaded with a complete format in order for
Windows to run properly. What is needed is to back up your current data to
an external hard drive. I can send you a boot cd that will allow us to use
a Linux program to retrieve your data and back it up to an external device.
Then you can reload your OS and programs and we can restore the data. I can
assist you with this from remote with the CD I can send you. If you would
like to discuss this option please feel free to call me.

Hope this helps,

Andy

Andy Smith
Master PC Technician
Jandy Computer Services
17 Lafayette St.
Lewiston, ME 04240
Phone 207-784-7276
Cell 207-240-4546
(e-mail address removed)
http://www.jandy.net
 
'Peachest2 said:
HELP! Over 2.5 weeks ago, my computer stopped booting to the desktop. No
icons, nothing shows...but 3 screens. One screen is the Microsoft XP logo,
one is "shut off mode in 5 seconds" and there is another one with white
writing....somethiing File. When I ca lled this Microsoft help place, they
told me to turn my computer off and keep pressing F8 over and over. We
tried
to reboot with the safe mode, and all this other options on that list.
Nothing. They said it sounds like my version of XP is corrupted. Finally,
they said that I need to get the XP Home Edition disc and re-install it.
Well, my computer is 6 years old abd Sony Vaio doesn't give you the disc
when
you buy it. They said that I would be able to reinstall XP Home Edition
WITHOUT losing any of my data.

So, I had to buy the XP Home Edition. I bought it from an E-Bay seller. He
sent the Pro edition, so I had to return it because it said I would lose
my
data if I installed it. I was assured by these Microsoft techs if I bought
the same edition (XP Home Edition) I would not lose my data. It wouldn't
try
to "reformat" the drive.

Well, this afternoon I just go the XP Home Edition in the mail, put it in,
and it says that C drive either has something incompatible with XP, hasn't
been formatted, etc. etc. It won't let me install on D drive. But, it says
if
installed it will need to format the drive and CAUTION ALL data will be
lost.!!!

Is there any way to re-install without it losing my data? I think most of
my important data is on D but I know some is still on C too. I'm about to
self-combust :-)

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Click to expand...

You probably should get some in-person help with this.

The place to start, since you value your data, is to find someone with
another XP system that has plenty of drive space, attach your drive to their
system, and copy your files off.

If you can't do that, then take another approach: go buy a new hard disk,
where I am 250 gig disks are about $60, remove your old disk and set it
aside, put the new one in, and install to that. Only after the install is
complete will you attach the old hard disk and copy your files. This is
probably the fastest and most reliable approach; your old drive at 6 years
old is heading towards end-of-life anyway.

Note that you will probably have to have another PC with internet access
handy so that you can download the drivers you will need to make the system
work after the basic XP install. Get these from the Sony Vaio site.

Your Vaio may not come with disks, and in that case it *will* have come with
a recovery partition. Power down, power back up and carefully watch the
screen for what key to press to enter the recovery process. I would NOT
suggest that you attempt this before backing up the data.

If you replace the drive, you will lose this partition, BUT, if you clone
the existing disk to a new disk, then set the old disk aside, install the
new disk, you can use the recovery partition on the new, cloned copy.
Again, at the end, you will attach the old drive and copy your data back.

You cannot do a repair install on an OEM install with a retail disk.

Where you are now, is in a place where there is significant risk to your
data. You should make sure that your data exists somewhere other than on
that hard disk before going any further with attempting to repair the XP
install.

HTH
-pk
 
well, if the o.s. was
functional previously,

then it is doubtful it
needs to be reinstalled.

--------------

also, you can probably
run some commands
at the disk prompt
like:

chkdsk /p
fixboot

and hopefully, the
issue you have won't
be a corrupted registry.

but a corrupted registry
is also fixable.

to get to the disk
prompt and bypass
the windows o.s.,

boot up with a winxp
cd and select "repair".

this will launch the
recovery console and
provide you with a
disk prompt where you
can initiate commands.

also, there is a new
program / utility provided by
the alvira antivirus makers.

I haven't tried it or tested
it, but may be worth a try:

http://www.free-av.com/en/tools/12/avira_antivir_rescue_system.html


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