Notebook wont start up advice needed

[lawdylaw]

Hi everyone. I'm new here and I think I'm in trouble! I have a sony Vaio which has decided not to start up anymore. I shut down the computer over the weekend and when I tried to start up again it doesn't respond. I have tried the F8 button and selected safe mode but it just returns to a black screen offering the same start up options again. Am caught in a vicious circle here and need some advice. I have no idea what has happened and it all seems a bit bleak.
Please can someone help?
Thanks.

 

[alidabiri]

can you check the memory?

 

[lawdylaw]

No, I cant check anything...just a black screen, and then it returns to start up options under the heading "sorry for the inconvenience but windows start up was unsuccessful.........
Have tried F8 and F10. F8 gives me the same start up options with additional blue line at the bottom and F10 only offers to wipe everything off my hard drive for me. Not nice at all....

 

[alidabiri]

what are the options?

 

[lawdylaw]

OK, options are;
safe mode
safe mode with networking
safe mode with command prompt
last known configuration
normal start up

 

[alidabiri]

when you choose one of the options, what happens?
can you choose last known good configuration?
you may have to do a repair install of windows.

 

[lawdylaw]

Normal start up just retuns me to the screen after failing to start up. I get the VAIO screen then it goes black and I'm back to square one.
Last known configuration is the same
Safemode shows me a list of system 32 files (loadsof them) and then also shows the VAIO screen for a couple of seconds before blacking out and returning to the option screen. All three safemode options are the same story.
To make things worse (as if this were possible at this juncture) my sony recovery wizard discs will not allow me to restore windows. The option is there but it wont let me select it. This leaves the "delete everything options only" and "restore C drive and applications" Of course no windows cd was supplied with the notebook, it was already installed.

 

[alidabiri]

does it have a floppy drive.
you might have to call the vaio's support to see why you don't have a cd for the operating system. this is a new thing that M$ and hardware makers have started. they don't ship any cd's for the os with the computer. and this is what happens. you can't do a clean re-install. since you have a licensed os, you can borrow a cd from a friend and try repairing the os that way.

 

[lawdylaw]

Yes, I saw the 6 disc floppy option.....dont have a floppy drive though do I? I also live on a really small island in Northern Mozambique and to add to my distress, all the other staff use xp pro while I am on xp home and I understand that it has to be the same OS if I am to do a clean install. Is this correct? I guess downloading the free floppy option onto a cd wont help matters either will it?

 

[Tedster]

XP home and pro are 100% compatible. The only difference between the two is pro offers a few more disk editing features and programmer features.

You should have no compatibility problems with work.

As far as your laptop goes, your battery may have died. Replace the laptop battery - that's the #1 cause of laptop boot failures.

If it powers on and you're starting to get loading issues, your registry may be corrupt. Without a backup to a secondary storage device, you're going to lose whatever is on the hard disk. You're going to have to load XP onto the latop from scratch. You may need to purchase it.

If that is the case, look on the bright side. Retail XP is better than OEM. It is more universal.

 

[lawdylaw]

Thanks, am really trying to see the bright side and you are helping me to do so. Just waiting for delivery of xp home to do a clean install and take things from there. I do have a product key for this as it came on the computer so fingers crossed and we'll see what happens..................?