My laptop wont start up!!

rose28454

I have a 2 year old Dell and it has been fine. However when I switched it on today it comes up with error messages and says it has to repair. Now it seems to be asking me for the restore disk which I doint seem to have. It is Windows Vista. What can I do??

busenbust

Do any of the recovery options in this thread help; I don't necessarily think you need the discs to access the recovery console...anyhow, have a peruse.

rose28454

busenbust wrote: »

Do any of the recovery options in this thread help; I don't necessarily think you need the discs to access the recovery console...anyhow, have a peruse.

Had a quick look and I cant access that recovery menu by pressing F8

When I start up it dierects me to System Recovery Option, after selecting UK keyboard it goes to a screen saying System recovery Options amd says only Windows Vista systems are listed and can be repaired ( nothing on list though!) and says if you dont see an operating system then load drivers for the hard disk As I dont have nay I go to next screen and it comes up wiyth

Start Up Repair ( tried does not work)

System Restore ( not working either)

Windows Complete PC Restore

Windows Memory Diagnostic Tool

Command Prompt

Dell Factory Image Restore

I dony have driver or a disk so where to now??

busenbust

Windows Complete PC Restore



Dell Factory Image Restore

Any of these work?

closed

depends if you are prepared to lose your data? factory restore will wipe it.

busenbust

Risk/reward then....your call :cool:.

{The recovery options - some of them - I referred to would have meant your data would have remained intact}.

Rigid

There's no need to lose any data.

If you can get access to another computer with an internet connection, download Linux Mint and burn it to a CD. This can be used to boot without installing to the hard drive. Then access your data and drag it to a USB pen drive.

Once you've done the above it's safe to proceed to the Dell Factory Image Restore option.

rose28454

Rigid wrote: »

There's no need to lose any data.

If you can get access to another computer with an internet connection, download Linux Mint and burn it to a CD. This can be used to boot without installing to the hard drive. Then access your data and drag it to a USB pen drive.

Once you've done the above it's safe to proceed to the Dell Factory Image Restore option.

And I would not any discs for that? Just downloading Linus Mint as suggested on my dd;s comp

rose28454

I have downloaded Linus to a disc. Now I have tried to boot from the disc but it does not seem to work. How do I boot from the disc?

closed

Can you see a .iso file on the disc? If so, you need to use the burn a disc image facility in your burning software, not just burn the file to disc.

http://portableapps.com/apps/utilities/infrarecorder_portable (use write image option)

If you have done it properly, you may have to press a key (F12 commonly) at bootup, or change the boot order in the bios, to boot from cd first before hard disk

What are the error messages when it boots, and what happened yesterday to cause this?

If anyone else is reading this, please don't click on the free iso burner link quoted below,

rose28454

closed wrote: »

Can you see a .iso file on the disc? If so, you need to use the burn a disc image facility
If you have done it properly, you may have to press a key (F12 commonly) at bootup, or change the boot order in the bios, to boot from cd first before hard disk

What are the error messages when it boots, and what happened yesterday to cause this?

It shows on the Disc drive as an Iso Image File on the disc. Ipressed F12 but although I changes to the Cd Drive it keeps going back to the error message that gives me a choice between Repairing or running Windows as normal. When I choose the latter it just defaults back to the previous screen. I have tried the repair thing a couple of times but always comes back to same screen.
This week I have burned a couple of CDs and added some files ands pictures from my old desktop that I am disposin of.