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The popular black screen at start-up *Please help*

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I am trying to fix my mother’s 8 year old Desktop. When i start it up, it goes to the screen that says ‘Windows didn’t start properly’ and gives me options on how to start. ie. safe mode, etc. Problem is, whatever i choose (inc. safe mode) i still end up with the cursor and a blank screen. When it used to work, it never shut down properly, it always got stuck in the “Windows shutting down” blue screen but will stay there all day until i force the off button. Please help!! Are these symtpoms of a virus or hardware malfunction? considering how old the machine is. The windows version is XP. Thanks!!

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In reply to The popular black screen at start-up *Please help*

Clarifications

Being 8 years old there will be quite a few problems.

In reply to The popular black screen at start-up *Please help*

The only true fix (and a better way) is to get a new computer. The motherboard you most probably have can only handle windows 3.1 or 95. So having XP on this machine is not doing it any good. It will cost you more to sort out than to get another computer. Though saying that you can put on a Linux disk. Some Linux distro’s are small enough to use on this type of motherboard. the one that comes to mind is:
DamnsmallLinux:
http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/download.html
Click on the link above and then click on the top link in the list. You will see this:

Up to higher level directory
File: GPL_Sources.txt 1 KB 2.6.2005 0:00:00
Directory: archive 28.1.2008 0:00:00
Directory: current 28.1.2008 0:00:00
Directory: dsl-n 14.4.2007 0:00:00
Directory: mydsl 30.3.2008 22:30:00
Directory: release_candidate 1.4.2008 19:00:00

Now click on the link that says “Directory: current”, this will take you to you another page of where you can download an ISO file.
Click on this file
“File: dsl-4.2.5-syslinux.iso 49282 KB 28.1.2008 0:00:00”.
Now this file will download onto your computer. You will need an ISO burner of which you can download here:
Active ISO Burner 1.1:
http://www.softpedia.com/get/CD-DVD-Tools/Data-CD-DVD-Burning/Active-ISO-Burner.shtml

Active ISO Burner description

Freeware developed to help you burn ISO image to CD/DVD

Active@ ISO Burner is a free tool which allows you to burn an ISO image file to CD-R, DVD-R, DVD+R, CD-RW, DVD-RW and DVD+RW…

Steps to create a CD if you have downloaded Active@ ISO Burner:
? Download the ISO CD image to a folder on your computer.
? Insert a blank CD in your CD-RW drive.
? Run Active@ ISO Burner.
? Type the path to ISO image file or click Browse button to locate it via standard File Open dialog.
? Click the [BURN ISO!] button to start the process of writing ISO image to CD.
When done then just slot this into the computer. It should have the drivers for your computer so that you can access the internet and to write documents.

Please post back if you have any more problems or questions.
If this information is useful, please mark as helpful. Thanks.

Actually, an 8 year old computer

In reply to Being 8 years old there will be quite a few problems.

would be designed to run win98, and borderline on being able to run win2k. (this is 2008) B-)

That being said, even a full wipe/reload will not resolve the conflict with the MB and XP, and the replacement is the single best option.

If money is the hold-up, referbs are a good way to go. $250, and you are going again.

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