Laptop Trouble- Windows XP

dg647

Hi, I was wondering if anyone would be able to help me out with this problem.

It's a Dell Laptop, Inspiron 1501 working on XP.

I can't start it up, it gives me a few options like to start in Safe Mode, start in Last settings that work etc but nothing works.

I end up getting a blue screen with the message:

STOP: c0000218 {Registry File Failure}
The registry cannot load the hive (file):
\SystemRoot\System32\Config\SOFTWARE
or its log or alternate.
It is corrupt, absent, or not writable.

Beginning dump of physical memory
Physical memory dump complete.
Contact your system administrator or technical support group for further assistance.

I have the re installation disk if that will be if any use to me.
I hope I have posted this in the right place.
I would really appreciate any help, thanks.

Capt'n Midnight

sounds like registry is corrupt
you can replace it with a copy from the system volume information folder

reinstalling may not solve the problem

Rosco_Weird

boot it in safe mood,and do a system restore till the closest date you know it was difinately working,

help on how to do a system restore : here

dg647

I tried a safe mode start but I was still getting a similar message. I will give it another try. Thanks for the advice

RoadKillTs

There's a good guide here to what Capt'n Midnight was talking about. That should do the trick.

dg647

Ok so I am trying to follow the instructions given in the link but when I go to type in the commands I get messages like
The system cannot find the file specified

The system cannot find the file or directory specified

Can I just re-install XP again. There is nothing that I really need on the laptop, I have all my files on an external, so I wouldn't be too worried about re-installing.

RoadKillTs

Hi dg647,

There are a good few commands so you might just be making a typo. When are you getting the error you mentioned?

Yes you could just re-install it with the cd. It's up to you.

Capt'n Midnight

I usually use a linux boot disk for this , far too much to type in the stripped down command prompt you get with recovery console

dg647

Can I just do a complete new install with the CD? Does anyone have a link to a good site where it explains this? Thanks again for all of the help

RoadKillTs

If you live in town you can drop it into me and I will repair the registry. Should only take a few minutes or there's a guide here on how to do a clean install of xp.

dg647

Thanks for that, I am down in Cork though. I will try that link that you posted, thanks again

dg647

I am going for a new install. There is a partition 2 [NTFS] 54031MB in size. Can I delete this? I presume this is the XP that is already on the laptop?

Fysh

dg647 wrote: »

I am going for a new install. There is a partition 2 [NTFS] 54031MB in size. Can I delete this? I presume this is the XP that is already on the laptop?

Yep, that'll be it. One thing you could do though to try and avoid losing everything would be a repair install - see here for details. It may well not work, but it's worth trying - I've fixed a few problems in the past this way.

dg647

Done a new install so it is running faster than ever now. Thanks again to everyone for all the help