booting issues

October 28, 2005 3:59 PM

I was messing around with nlite and ended up making some sort of change to my computer that I just can't figure out. All is basically well except for one thing--- Every time I boot the computer the first menu says something like "Press 'R' for Standard System Recovery Options " and then Press 'F' for reformmting the drive and Q to quit if i hit R i go to the recovery utility HAVEN'T tried F for obvious reasons and Q seems to read the boot ini file. when i hit Q, my normal boot process works and All is OK. However all subsequent reboots give me that same R, F and Q menu and I'd like to get back to just booting in to Windows. Can anyone offer some advice as to how to tell the computer that all is well? i wouldn't want a family member to reboot the computer and select the wrong option. I'm running Windows XP MCE.
posted by swisscheez to Computers & Internet (7 answers total)

From your description, it sounds like maybe you started the Recovery Console inadvertantly. Here's a link about how to delete the Console. As part of that page, here's the link about deleting the Console. I'd proceed with caution as I've personally have never used this feature, maybe other users have actual experience with it.
posted by jasper411 at 4:49 PM on October 28, 2005

Response by poster: Thanks for the reply. I'm not sure this is exactly the issue. When I do hit "r" I go to a GUI appatrently made by HP. I'll have to search through their documentation to see if there is anything helpful.
posted by swisscheez at 5:05 PM on October 28, 2005

Maybe you're right - but I got to that answer by googling for "Press R for Standard System Recovery Options Windows XP"
posted by jasper411 at 5:11 PM on October 28, 2005

Best answer: Not to insult your intelligence, but is there a floppy in the drive?
posted by jclovebrew at 5:56 PM on October 28, 2005

http://www.majorgeeks.com/download4324.html is this what you mean by nlite? What were you trying to do? It sounds like it could be a bootloader; is there a small "FAT" partition on your hard drive? I've seen dell's, hp's, and compaq do this; maybe the boot order was switched.
posted by AllesKlar at 6:47 PM on October 28, 2005

Usually a utility partition; like jclovebrew suggests, is there a dvd/cd in your cd/dvd drive?
posted by AllesKlar at 6:49 PM on October 28, 2005

Response by poster: jclovebrew - i take no insult from the remark. However, you win the prize! There was a DVD in the drive and that was causing the problem. I'm just happy I didn't spend anymore time on this.
In fact, though this doesn't make me feel a lot better, I realized the error of my ways before reading the responses. Thanks for the input from all.
Sorry to have wasted your time.
posted by swisscheez at 12:27 PM on October 29, 2005