I know, I know, get a Mac...
May 23, 2006 7:38 AM Subscribe
Computer Won't Boot -- needless to say [MI]:
I apologize up front if this question is a bit redundant w/r/t other AskMeFi questions I saw, but I'm greatly in need of advice/reassurance.
My Win XP PC worked fine as of last evening; it was shut down properly. This morning my Fiance tried to turn it on I was in the bathroom, I came out and saw a Blue Disc repair screen checking the disk for errors (This is not the first time this has happened; at the time I was concerned though not especially worried). I walked out of the room and came back. It wasn't loading. I saw that my Fiance had turned on my computer without unplugging my iPod and this halted the OS from loading.
I unplugged the iPod and it started to load. It got as far as the win logo screen with the progress bar-- then the screen went black and my monitor flashed an "INPUT MODE NOT SUPPORTED" message I had never seen before. It starts the booting process over at this point and will do so indefinitely unless I turn it off/uplug.
I tried starting in safe mode, debugging mode and last known good configuration. XP still won't load.
What can I do? My computer was buit for me and I do not have the installation XP discs, assuming that's the problem... Will Geek Squad have the necessary repair discs if I shell out a hundred bucks for them to show up at my apartment?
For bonus points, if I burn a linux live CD will that allow me to plug-in an an external hard drive via USB and rescue my files that way? (I have around 100 GB of stuff to recover).
Thanks in advance...
I apologize up front if this question is a bit redundant w/r/t other AskMeFi questions I saw, but I'm greatly in need of advice/reassurance.
My Win XP PC worked fine as of last evening; it was shut down properly. This morning my Fiance tried to turn it on I was in the bathroom, I came out and saw a Blue Disc repair screen checking the disk for errors (This is not the first time this has happened; at the time I was concerned though not especially worried). I walked out of the room and came back. It wasn't loading. I saw that my Fiance had turned on my computer without unplugging my iPod and this halted the OS from loading.
I unplugged the iPod and it started to load. It got as far as the win logo screen with the progress bar-- then the screen went black and my monitor flashed an "INPUT MODE NOT SUPPORTED" message I had never seen before. It starts the booting process over at this point and will do so indefinitely unless I turn it off/uplug.
I tried starting in safe mode, debugging mode and last known good configuration. XP still won't load.
What can I do? My computer was buit for me and I do not have the installation XP discs, assuming that's the problem... Will Geek Squad have the necessary repair discs if I shell out a hundred bucks for them to show up at my apartment?
For bonus points, if I burn a linux live CD will that allow me to plug-in an an external hard drive via USB and rescue my files that way? (I have around 100 GB of stuff to recover).
Thanks in advance...
Once you've got access to the drive, see if you've got c:\i386 or c:\windows\i386 folders. If so, you can copy them off and rebuild an XP CD to reinstall with from another machine. A repair install might well sort you out.
posted by ed\26h at 8:03 AM on May 23, 2006
posted by ed\26h at 8:03 AM on May 23, 2006
I've been in several situations like this myself, and have helped many friends who've been there. In each case, I've used Spinrite. Basically, you create a bootable CD and on boot several extended disk checks and repairs are run.
This software has gotten me out of more than a few sticky situations where data was at stake. The software isn't free, but I've never once regretted the money I spent on it.
posted by jcummings1974 at 2:11 PM on May 23, 2006
This software has gotten me out of more than a few sticky situations where data was at stake. The software isn't free, but I've never once regretted the money I spent on it.
posted by jcummings1974 at 2:11 PM on May 23, 2006
This thread is closed to new comments.
It sounds, generally, like you have a software issue. My next step would be to boot from my XP CD and try to repair from there. I don't know if the Geek Squad guys will have one; surely you can find a copy on a pirate site somewhere...
posted by autojack at 7:56 AM on May 23, 2006