Stuck on 'Windows is starting up...'

The Black Oil

Discovered this just before 8pm this evening...

Turned on my machine it doesn't make it to the usal login screen with my name etc, it just sits there on 'Windows is starting up...' Tried restarting it obviously, didn't make any difference...left it for a few mins just in case it was slow, nadda.

Can't recall installing anything recently, nor downloading anything other than tunes...and Anti Virus and Windows updates. Last big thing I did was probably transfer 4+ gigs of files to to mp3 player.

It was working fine last night, 100% or as 100% as XP can do.

Getting in Safe Mode or Last Known Working Config etc etc doesn't seem to work. Booting with XP CD I get some prompt thing H:\i386...can't remember the rest will try it again if if youse want to know the full details.

Hopefully not a wipe and reinstall job, but I will do so if needs be.

Any ideas on what's going on or how I can get in and check?

Note to self buy another HD for future random f**k ups.

Brendan552004

I have dumped my XP, too many problems, conflicts. Back to 2000 professional.

I have had the same problem, it is a boot problem. On startup select Del when prompted, then select "fail safe defaults" worked for me.

The Black Oil

It's XP Pro...Load Fail Safe Defaults doesn't seem to work. If I put this HD into another conputer will I be able to salvage music, word docs etc by dumping them onto it before sticking the HD back into my machine in order to wipe it...if that makes any sense.

I have 2000 on CD too...hmmm.

irishgeo

try booting off the cd and click a new install and when is detects a previous install doing a repair by pressing R. This will repair windows and will not affect any of your data.

Laguna

Sorry mate. I've had this problem numerous times with my XP. I tried every trick in the book to fix it every time, the only thing worked was fresh install..