HELP!! Trying to Repair Windows XP - can't finish Setup

Hungerdunger

I started a thread a few days ago asking if anyone had suggestions for why my desktop PC takes over 5 minutes to boot up.

After going through the obvious causes, it was suggested that I repair my Windows installation following the advice on this website. I have followed the instructions, but at the stage where the computer reboots to continue the installation, it gets as far as the Windows "splash" screen, then for a split second a blue screen with text appears and the machine reboots, and repeats this cycle.

I have a nasty feeling that a reformat may be the only answer, but I really don't want to do that if at all possible (the machine was working fine apart from the long boot-up time), so would be extremely grateful for suggestions on how to complete the installation and get it working again..

Finally, do you think this would qualify me for the "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" award for 2008 :rolleyes:

mdbarber

I had that recently from a windows xp version 1 cd, could have been the disk as it was a wee bit scratched, try cleaning disk or using diff cd drive

Cat695

good time to buy a new harddrive install windows on that and just use your other harddrive as a backup and storage.....that way you don't have to reformat it till after you've saved all the stuff you want from it

harddrives now are dirt cheap

IcyEars

You didn't say whether you had tried repairing your installation again after it failed or whether you only tried the process once. It's worth trying again since if a problem occurred during the repair, it can make the installation unbootable but running the repair again fixes it.

Also, have you tried booting into safemode and seeing if it might be a driver issue or soething that is stopping the machine from booting? Press F8 to get into safe mode when the machine frist starts up and select it from the menu. If you can get into safe mode successfully, it sounds like the reason it doesn't boot is because of a configuration issue (wrong driver, incorrect setting, etc) that si the problem and you should eb able to track the problem down and fix it. Use the bootlogging option to find out where the boot process fails and this will give you a clue as to what is wrong.

However, if a reformat is necessary and you need to save data off the old hard drive (but of course you don't because you backup regularily!) before reformatting, download a Linux live cd. This will let you boot the computer and move any data off the machine. You can either move it to another machine if you have one, burn it to CD/DVD or if you are feeling adventurous (and the harddrive has space), shrink the old partition and create a new one for your data (this can be a bit complex, but there are loads of how-tos on the interweb for doing it and I'm sure the good MSE'ers on here would be able to help!). One warning though, if you wanted to try the last option, you may loose all your data!!!

There are guides out there as well which walk you through diagnosing and fixing various Windows bootup problems using a live cd, so they may also be wortha go before wiping it and starting again.

Finally, and not really related to this, but I downloaded some imaging software that created a cd of a fresh install of my machine. If anything ever goes the shape of the pear, I use the CD to reinstall windows and everything is fine. Once you have all the drivers loaded again, it might be worth looking at this if it ever happens again. It's quicker to restore an image than do the whole setup from scratch.

I must say as well that I have my drive confugred with two partitions and I save all my data to the second partition so if windows dies, the data is safe on the second partition.

Finally, (and I know I am rambling on a bit - sorry) if I haven't killed my windows for a while, I resinatll anyway now and then just because of slowdown problems that occur due to using the operating system.

Anyway, I think I've typed enough so I will shut up now.

Hungerdunger

Thanks for all the replies so far. To answer various points raised:

I have tried cleaning the disk but with no improvement.

I tried getting into Safe Mode, but as the computer knows that it is still in the middle of Setup it tells me that Setup cannot be run in Safe Mode.

I have tried running Setup again, but the result is the same.

One thing I noticed was that the second time I ran Setup, there was a message "Set up has already attempted to upgrade the following Windows installation...." and it gives me the option of installing a fresh copy of Windows without repairing the old copy. I have enough hard drive space to do this, but I need to know whether this will overwrite existing data and program files. Can anyone answer this?

I am pretty well backed up, but would like to retain existing stuff if possible. I have been thinking about buying a new PC later this year anyway, so this solution would give me breathing space to save up, and to decide on the spec that I need.

mdbarber

At taht point windows will install to a new directory as long as you don't choose to format the hdd during the install.
Choose the option "leave current filesystem intact"
After that as long as you haven't made your documents folder private you should be able to access everything ok.