Help needed

[Seen]

Hi guys

Hope someone can help...

I turned on my PC this morning and got to the WELCOME screen....I clicked on OWNER as usual but as soon as my desktop appeared the PC then logged back out to the WELCOME screen. No matter how many times I clicked on OWNER it displayed my desktop background for about 1 sec then went back to the WELCOME screen.

I couldn't get into SAFE MODE and LAST KNOWN CONFIG didn't work either.

I then went about the Windows Reinstall procedure (as described here - Windowsreinstall.com - XP, Vista upgrade, install, reinstall, uninstall and repair guides), everything was going fine until I get to the SET-UP part, it gets to the bit where the green bar shows it installing devices, about 3/4 of the way up and with approx 34mins left of the set-up left, my PC just reboots and I'm stuck in an endless loop

Any ideas? Lots of stuff on my hard-drive I don't want to lose, some is backed up but loads of recent stuff not...nightmare if I lost it.

Thanks.

[Bigkegman]

I think it's the Internet police and they have finally caught up with you !!!


You Dirty

[kompressaur]

I can't think what the prob could be Seen. A suggestion would be to do a clean install windows on a new hard drive and just use your old one as a slave so as you can get all your data off it. Hope you sort it Seen as i sounds like a bugger

[wazik]

sounds like your hard drive could be gubbed. The fact that it gets as far as the os but wont let you reinstall is a bit weird though.

It could be your os is gubbed but the fact you cant reinstall would indicate its your drive. You could try a CHKDSK /R from the recovery console. Instructions here....

To run the Recovery Console from the Windows XP startup disks or the Windows XP CD-ROM, follow these steps:
1. Insert the Windows XP startup disk into the floppy disk drive, or insert the Windows XP CD-ROM into the CD-ROM drive, and then restart the computer.

Click to select any options that are required to start the computer from the CD-ROM drive if you are prompted.
2. When the "Welcome to Setup" screen appears, press R to start the Recovery Console.

3. If you have a dual-boot or multiple-boot computer, select the installation that you must access from the Recovery Console.

4. When you are prompted, type the Administrator password. If the administrator password is blank, just press ENTER.

5. At the command prompt, type the appropriate commands to diagnose and repair your Windows XP installation.

At this point you want to type "CHKDSK /R" which will scan your hard drive for damaged sectors and attempt to repair them.

It may take a while, like a few hours while but just let it run. Dont be alarmed if it gets to 75% then goes back to 30% and jumps around thats normal. If it does fix it then get back in asap and get everything backed up. It can fix a drive but you normally find it will happen again quicker each time you do this if there are dodgy sectors on your disc.


For a list of commands that are available in Recovery Console, type recovery console commands or help at the command prompt, and then press ENTER.

For information about a specific command, type help commandname at the command prompt, and then press ENTER.
6. To exit the Recovery Console and restart the computer, type exit at the command prompt, and then press ENTER.


If this doesnt work then as Komp says get it slaved, get your data off and its new hard drive time I think.

Instructions from How to install and use the Recovery Console in Windows XP

[rene]

hey seen does it work?

[slick]

It probably did Rene but knowing Seen you wont get a thank u, kiss my arse or nothing.

But if he does read this i'd like to tell him i've just spotted his book on ebay and rapidshare as an ebook so obviously somebody has scanned it and decided to make a few bob for themselves

[Seen]

Hi guys

thanks Wazik for the advice but it was to no avail - the hard drive is goosed and I've lost everything I'm sure

On a PC help forum someone gave me some advice which to type in when in Recovery mode, one command was fixboot, anyway to cut a long story short this seemed to have made my hard drive show up as 4G (all free space) instead of 120G (approx 70G free).

Also started getting HARD DISK FAILURE 50% of the time when trying to boot up, I then put another clean hard drive in and got HARD DISK FAILURE again, which suggested the motherboard was fucking it up or something.

Finally got it working but it showed my old drive (as slave) as having 120G but all free space, so 50G of used space was now unused ie data gone

Dunno what happened to it, maybe the motherboard was dying and caused the drive to fuck up, odd how the clean drive I put in had similar problems.

Anyway, I reinstalled windows on it (after quick format) and it worked (this on another PC as master drive) so I took it out, put it back in my PC and it came up HARD DISK FAILURE

So am resigned to the fact my data is lost, I'm currently using my daughters PC which she is not exactly happy about (myspace/messenger withdrawals) and am on the lookout for a new PC.

(I'm having great fun logging into my daughters accounts and pretending to be a 14yo girl....eeeh, the things people say to me....disgusting perverts....shocking....errr I'm off now for another chat session )

[rene]

It probably did Rene but knowing Seen you wont get a thank u, kiss my arse or nothing.

But if he does read this i'd like to tell him i've just spotted his book on ebay and rapidshare as an ebook so obviously somebody has scanned it and decided to make a few bob for themselves

that´s very good slick ..

[Seen]

Originally Posted by slick

But if he does read this i'd like to tell him i've just spotted his book on ebay and rapidshare as an ebook so obviously somebody has scanned it and decided to make a few bob for themselves

That'll be ODM, the baldy cunt

[Computer Guy]

Originally Posted by Seen

...errr I'm off now for another chat session )

it must be strange for you having a chat with people more mature than yourself.

[Seen]

Ladies and Gentlemen....I give you, the worlds greatest living comedian....


COMPUTER GUY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

()

[cains]

Have you just accepted to have lost your data or are you still interested in saving your data??

Getdataback is a usefull program to recover lost data... But need to have windows installed on another disk, and use the faulty disk as slave, or connected through usb ..

Have saved a few disk in my life, if you get in any trouble again....