WinXP Home setup looping

A customer’s computer with Windows XP Home is continually looping in setup. The computer already had winXP Home installed and they installed some third party software (games) that gave the user a promt to reinstall windows? The user in ignorance did and now when the computer is turned on it automatically goes into setup. even if you boot from the CD it doesn’t prompt for recovery console or setup it just goes straight into setup. setup gets to “installing devices” and some GeneLink device (NIC card I assumed) and then restarts the computer and does the same thing over and over again. I took out the NIC and modem and it still does the same thing.

What can I do to get setup to stop automatically beginning?!?