XP Won't boot?

Perform a Windows In-Place re-Installation:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=315341

You may wish to try an XP Recovery first, just please ensure taht you read and understand all yhe instructions.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;307654

both the in-place upgrade(reinstallation) of xp and the recovery console are great ideas, but when i asked if my friend still had his xp cd, i got one of those blank looks with one ear flopped up.......you know like the RCA dog. So no CD to boot with. Isn't there a way to just go to a strait Dos promt and work some magic from there? obviously something has corrupted windows and is not allowing it to start properly right so if was a perfect world shouldn't all those cabs be there still? and if i could just get to the restore point prior to his problem should be able to fix and go from there? right? so how to get there?

Try these TechRepublic links. Much useful info.

https://www.techrepublic.com.com/5100-10877-6031733.html

https://www.techrepublic.com.com/5208-11183-0.html?forumID=5&threadID=188890&start=0

However, the last time I received this was when the hard drive had failed. To recover info, slave it to another PC, copy all information to another hard drive. Don't try to write to the drive before recovering needed information.
Only when info is saved do you want to try any of the above suggestions, since writing anything to the drive may make it unreadable.

If your friend doesn't have the Windows XP CD then the best advice is to borrow a CD from someone and perform the repair.

Or take the system to a repair shop and have them repair it.

well tried to boot from my xp cd am doing a inplace up grade now with it because the other did not work. I did how ever see this ???
HP WIRE LESS MNGR.EXE APPLICATION ERROR
the instruction at " 0x76b2398c" referanced memory at "0x00000000". the memory could not be "read" click on ok to terminate the program or click on cancel to debug the program.

Niether do anything to boot the subject to life. so tring the in place with my xp cd............we'll see what will happen............only HAL knows?????????

well did the in place install, seems to working but of course windows will not log in untill i activate. so i tried, looks like this system has wireless tried to comect like that...........nope didn't work . tried strait into my cable modem nope that didn't work either. says it can't find my network conection. have to wonder if it doesn't have somethin to do with that error that i posted earlier. it still comes up even after the install. tried safe mode got the same results.......need to activate first, so i am a bit stuck. any ideas???

Point value changed by question poster.

Just a word of Warning here don't activate before you have it working properly. If you need to do a clean install you'll have to go through it all again and to MS it will look as if you are installing Pirate Copies of their Software.

The best thing that you can do from here to to save all of the data and then wipe the HDD and do a clean install with the Product Key on the COA and then Ring MS for an Activation Code.

The only good thing here is that XP has it's own range of Product Codes available to each version so you'll need to use the exact same version of XP to perform the reinstall. If it had Home on it then you'll need to use Home and the same applies if it had Pro originally Installed you'll need to use that type of CD but don't be surprised if you are given the [b]Third Degree[/b] by MS when you try to Activate it as you are most likely using a different form of install CD to what was originally supplied which may not have required Activation if it came from HP, Dell or the like.

When you do things like this it confuses the Hell out of the people at MS. :)

Of course if you want to do things according to MS you can always sell new copies of all MS Software to your friend and tell him/her of the importance of keeping their install Cd's in a safe place. :D

Col

You can activate a legal copy of Windows using their free automated phone response system. It actually works pretty well and only takes a few minutes. You just need to be at the PC with the activation window open.

ok I ended up doing a inplace install like sugested, and activated it with my key. Am haveing trouble fully removeing mcaffe so my trend micro will install. inaddition still have that hp error. when in and removed mcaffe from controll panel but it is still there. so went to msconfig and unchecked the the boxes for mcaffe and the hpwireless manager. rebooted and hp error is gone but not the mcaffe. What to do??? where do i look in registry or do i just use a good register cleaner? any sugestions???

You prolly won't like this much, but follow the instructions on this link.

http://ts.mcafeehelp.com/faq.asp?frames=1&docid=68717&CategoryId=245&chat

It requires some registry editing, but it's really your only choice if you can't get to it via add/remove programs.

--yargls.