Ok guys I need help bigtime.......I've spent most of today running around in circles!
Mt daughters pc is down. It wont boot at all, just gets to the windows screen with the bullets going left to right, and goes straight to bsod.
I've tried running chkdsk from the xp cd, but as soon as I choose repair, and hit enter.......straight to bsod.
It wont even run maxtors hd utility!!........nothing seems to work at all.
Shes got pics and stuff she doesnt want to lose......short of plugging her hd into my pc and copying them to cd (assuming I will be able to see them) I've run out of ideas.......any help please.......pleeeeeeaase !

Did u change any hardware in her PC? Most often, incomatible hardware can cause this, especially motherboards. Please specify her system specs.

Nope , nothing new has gone on her pc, for a long time, hardware or software..........
It's an old spec pc ( my old one).......
jetway542B mobo
amd k6 2 450mhz
creative tnt2 vanta graphics
327mb sd ram
aopen dvd player
few fans
xp pro sp2
maxtor 20gb hd
........thats it I think,lol :knock:

Its probably ur mobo thats dying. Can u open the case up? If so, open it up and check the capacitors(those little cylinders on the mobo). If any are bulging or have holes in them, ur mobo is dying. Otherwise, it is a problem with ur HDD.

Thnx Rage.......will get the torch out ,lol

Update........
Looked at the mobo, all seemed ok......tried the hd in my pc....nothing!..... So decided the hd was history..
Bought a new Maxtor 80gb hd, plugged it in.....argghh!!.....pc wouldnt post....played with the bios 'til I was dizzy.....still wouldn't see it....damn!
Took it back to shop, they swapped it for another.....np.......back home.......same prob......
Plugged it into my pc.....saw it straight away....grrrr.
Tried it back in other pc.......no go.....tried one of my hd's in daughter's pc.......nope.
Found an old hd...(4.3gb) tried that.....woohoo..worked....installed xp and it's up and running, but slow!!!
Found latest bios for old mobo, but it doesn't say anything about support for big hd's.....hmmm......so havn't flashed bios....
Latest prob......can't install graphics drivers...keeps telling me it can't find compatable hardware.....sheesh !!....

thnx for your help so far guys........

Is any of the hardware, MOBO, video card, hard drive, etc. compatible with XP? I think your system predates XP so you may end your suffering with 98se. Xp may run on the older components but unreliably if at all.

But if you want XP the flaky HDD stuff may be the cable a simple replace may do. I recently pulled most of my hair out over a similar problem. Turned out in my case to be a loose pin on the hard drive. Everytime I plugged the IDE cable in it pushed the pin back - sometimes connecting, sometimes not.

I feel your pain!
Monton