Freezing during start-up

[masconomo]

My XP freezes on the blue windows logo welcome page during startup. Using F8 the "last good config" didn't work.

Any help would be gratefully appreciated. Thanks!

 

[raybay]

Brand and model of computer, or motherboard and hard drive, and age of hard drive.
That is a common symptom that your hard drive has failed and must be replaced. Do you have the Windows install disks?
Hard drives are relatively low in cost at www.directron.com, www.zipzoomfly.com, www.pcmall.com, www.newegg.com, www.frys.com, www.techdepot.com, www.cdw.com, www.krex.com, and other such sites... as low as $37 for an 80 GB drive, $45 for a 120 GB, $50 for a 160GB, and so on up to 2 TB for just over $110.

 

[masconomo]

Mr

This is an HP Pavilion a1473w and I would say that its about 6 to 7 years old. I have an XP reinstallation disk (from a Dell ccomputer).

 

[masconomo]

How can I try a system restore? Can I do one using safe mode or the recovery console? Earlier in the process I had to "replace" the ntldr files that were missing. Got that done but did not have any effect on the start up freeze.

 

[raybay]

Dell XP reinstallation disk will not work in your HP because it must be detected by the EEPROM to verify that it is a valid Dell (not HP) install disk.
Contact HP to see if they have any install disks remaining for that model. If they do, they will charge you $27 but that includes priority FedEx or UPS shipping.
If your hard drive has not bee previously replaced, then it has likely gone South and requires a hard drive replacement. Get the correct install disk from HP, then download all the drivers from the HP website, and you will be back in business.
Then you can recover most of your data installing this old drive as the <Slave> or using an external USB enclosure to copy the old data and emails.

 

[hrlow2]

Encountered a similar problem once when I mistakenly left a USB hub plugged in. Had 3 thumbdrives connected.
Was checking all for an OS.
Unplugged the hub and was back to normal.