Win XP Freezes on startup

[Ric2637]

I'm running Windows XP Home Edition on my PC, which has frozen during startup. It gets as far as the startup bar across the bottom of the screen followed by a very dim image of the Windows XP screen, but doesn't get any further. I then have to do a power down, after which (on starting again) I get the MS-DOS error screen message saying 'unfortunately there was an error during the last startup, please choose one of the following options' (or words to that effect.) If I choose to go back to the last known good configuration, I get the same result. Anyway, I restarted several times with the same result. The progress bar would move for about 10 seconds, then it would get ratchety and then finally freeze. I am able to startup OK in Safe Mode and connect to the internet.

 

[kimsland]

Start in Sfe mode
Go to my computer
Right click on C drive
Properties
Tools
Check Now
Tick top square
Start
OK YES OK

Restart wait for checkdisk to finish
Hopefully you will see normal mode

 

[Ric2637]

Kimsland,

I tried your solution and at the last part I got the message that I couldnt run the application as Windows needed exclusive access to certain files. It asked me if I wanted run it when windows restarted. I said yes and hit restart. Now I can't even get into safe mode! When starting in safe mode, the computer hangs on windows\system32\drivers\app440.sys

Any help???

 

[kimsland]

Do you mean AGP440.sys
If so then refer to this Microsoft support page (with exact issue)
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/324764

Also as a simple first option, at the second of loading AGP440.sys can you press ESC on the keyboard, to see if it continues.

 

[Ric2637]

ok, just went with system recovery and started fine. Now I have downloaded all the updates, but upon downloading SP2 it freezes? what the @#$%??

 

[kimsland]

https://www.techspot.com/vb/topic62524.html
Tutorial: How to use Memtest

 

[Ric2637]

Ok, I will try that and see how it goes. Thanks for all your help.