Laptop not booting

Steve_xx

daily wrote: »

Did you shut it down properly, if not, running chkdsk from recovery console might help.

I'll have a go because I think it might have happened during shutdown. How do I do that?

Steve_xx

Browntoa wrote: »

http://www.simplehelp.net/2007/05/19/how-to-share-files-and-folders-in-ubuntu/

should get them to appear on the network

Ok thanks I will have a look at that in a moment. Also before I restore it to factory, is there a way of gathering my Explorer bookmarks?

Browntoa

you would need an XP Home CD or download and boot with this

http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

has chkdsk built in

daily_2

You'll need a bootable vista or XP CD/DVD, or the vista recovery disk (which is freely downloadable) http://neosmart.net/blog/2008/windows-vista-recovery-disc-download/

Steve_xx

Browntoa wrote: »

you would need an XP Home CD or download and boot with this

http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

has chkdsk built in

OK well I'll have a go with downloading this and see if that puts it right before restoring it to factory. I guess I have to press the F12 button on the Dell and change it so that it boots from the ultimateboot cd? When I do this what will my screen be displaying and how will I get to the chkdsk utility?

Steve_xx

daily wrote: »

You'll need a bootable vista or XP CD/DVD, or the vista recovery disk (which is freely downloadable) http://neosmart.net/blog/2008/windows-vista-recovery-disc-download/

Thanks - I looked and note that the download is for Vista. I'm running XP on the Dell.

Browntoa

looks like I was wrong, used to be a utility in there but it's gone

Steve_xx

Browntoa wrote: »

looks like I was wrong, used to be a utility in there but it's gone

ok we found the ultimatebootcd software on the PC World site - will this include the chkdsk utility then?

Steve_xx

In the meantime I have downloaded the Unbuntu software, unzipped it and tried to put it onto a CD. It's too big for the CD and therefore I will have to hang fire until I go and get some DVD's which hopefully will hold all the Ubuntu files.

There's a folder on there called Autorun and I'm assuming that when I try to boot the Dell with the newly created disk that this is the file I will select? Also, will I be running the Unbuntu OS from the CD/DVD rather than actually installing it on the Dell?

Browntoa

you need the ISO file

http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/downloading?release=desktop-newest&mirror=http%3A%2F%2Fmirror.u-soft.dk%2Fubuntu-releases%2F&arch=i386

then just burn that to CD

it runs from the CD, not installed