Help? Can't boot!

Check that your HDD is detected during POST

Your post could have provided more information such as what hard drives you have installed. I gather that you have at least one hard drive that has Windows XP. If that's the case then your motherboard cannot see the hard drive when you do your power on self test (POST). There are a couple of possibilities that would cause this. First, the hard drive data cable may be loose or disconnected from the hard drive. Second, the power cable of the hard drive may be loose or disconnected. Third, the hard drive may have completely failed.

You should do this. Turn the power off on the computer. Open the case and check the data and power cables at both ends. If the data cable seems to be okay then disconnect it and reconnect it at both ends. Remove any dust near the cables. Turn the computer power back on. Look to see if the drive active light turns on for a moment while the machine is running its power on self test. Get back into the CMOS setup menu.

If the hard drive active light doesn't turn on for a moment while the machine is starting then the hard drive may be broken.

If the CMOS setup menu shows no hard drive detected then the hard drive may be broken.

Try using the CMOS autodetect function. If that doesn't detect any hard drives then your hard drive may be broken.

You probably noticed a trend with the conclusions. That's because the most likely cause of your problem is that the hard drive is broken.

If you no longer have the OS installation CD then you are SOL. You will have to purchase a new hard drive and a new copy/license of Windows XP.

Don't even think about asking how to get a bootleg copy of Windows XP or how to fake a license/registration number.

Good luck.

Several years ago I made the mistake of purchasing four IBM Deskstar disks. Three of them died within a year. The sequence that you describe powering up, failure to detect, warm boot, disk works, is the same that I found happened with my disks. Prior to the IBM disks I had good luck with several manufacturers. The only other manufacturer that I have had multiple problems with is Western Digital. Over time I had purchased three WD Caviar disks. All of them died within a short time.

If you went into the cmos and checked the standard and advanced cmos setup for boot sequence, double check if you can change the settings to HDD or IDE0.

If you can't, then I'll bet on your motherboard you have had the enabling flash boot block enabled.

This would have caused a virus or other binary files that was received to possibly overwrite it. This could also have happened if you have experienced many surges and brownouts with this jumper enabled.

What you can do, and this is the first course of action, is to open your system. Find the make of the motherboard, serial# and any revisions.

Next, locate your bios chip on the cmos (usually a rectangular chip) Note the revision and jot all the pertinent information. This includes the revision number and possibly the year as well as the manufacturer.

Go use another computer that has internet access. Locate the BIOS on the internet, driverguide.com is extremely good, but the manufacturer would be better. Just make sure the make of the motherboard and the make and revision of the BIOS all correspond.

Next, you'll have to download and make a boot disk (according to the manufacturer). Copy the binary file to the disk.

Print the instructions from the web and then go to your computer. Follow the steps (make sure not to interrupt the power or else you can be in trouble.

If everything goes fine, the system will power down itself. Turn on the computer and go into the BIOS. Automatically detect the settings and your BIOS should be fixed and your computer should be up and running.

However, if there is a more recent update to the BIOS on your computer (fixes) download that one and use it!

P.S.: Make sure to consult your users manual, if you don't have one get it off the motherboard and search on the internet and print it off.

Then disable flash boot block (or something like that). Then you are done. (This is the first thing you should attempt to do)!!!!!!

Next, if t doesn't work, you can do is read your motherboard manual. I know on servers they have a save way to restore the cmos, but I am not sure about desktops.

The other thing you can do, although you may have to find another person with the same configuration (programs installed, etc) or you can go to a computer store.

What you'll need them to do, if they are authorized to do it, is to create a set of boot disks for that operating system; copying system.dat and user.dat if possible.

Take those disks and insert them into the computer. Copy system.dat and user.dat to your system and reboot. This will only work if the computer was out of the factory (maybe you'll have to write the company to see if they can do you that)

If you went into the cmos and checked the standard and advanced cmos setup for boot sequence, double check if you can change the settings to HDD or IDE0.

If you can't, then I'll bet on your motherboard you have had the enabling flash boot block enabled.

This would have caused a virus or other binary files that was received to possibly overwrite it. This could also have happened if you have experienced many surges and brownouts with this jumper enabled.

What you can do, and this is the first course of action, is to open your system. Find the make of the motherboard, serial# and any revisions.

Next, locate your bios chip on the cmos (usually a rectangular chip) Note the revision and jot all the pertinent information. This includes the revision number and possibly the year as well as the manufacturer.

Go use another computer that has internet access. Locate the BIOS on the internet, driverguide.com is extremely good, but the manufacturer would be better. Just make sure the make of the motherboard and the make and revision of the BIOS all correspond.

Next, you'll have to download and make a boot disk (according to the manufacturer). Copy the binary file to the disk.

Print the instructions from the web and then go to your computer. Follow the steps (make sure not to interrupt the power or else you can be in trouble.

If everything goes fine, the system will power down itself. Turn on the computer and go into the BIOS. Automatically detect the settings and your BIOS should be fixed and your computer should be up and running.

However, if there is a more recent update to the BIOS on your computer (fixes) download that one and use it!

Good luck.

What you can do is read your motherboard manual. I know on servers they have a save way to restore the cmos, but I am not sure about desktops.

The other thing you can do, although you may have to find another person with the same configuration (programs installed, etc) or you can go to a computer store.

What you'll need them to do, if they are authorized to do it, is to create a set of boot disks for that operating system; copying system.dat and user.dat if possible.

Take those disks and insert them into the computer. Copy system.dat and user.dat to your system and reboot. This will only work if the computer was out of the factory (maybe you'll have to write the company to see if they can do you that)

I think I forgot to mention this is a laptop. I don't know anything about where anything is located in it. It is only two years old, but I only started using heavily in July. Before then, I used my desktop and the laptop had only been used for a total of about 30 hours.

backup backup backup.....i tell every one but no-one listens...all you can do is pray, or run ASR..Whooops you cant...unless you borrow one.. awww never mind buy another copy of windows or go open source.

CHEAK ALL YOUR IDE CABLES