Computer Crash

[Bradford]

OK - for all you more computer savvy folks out there than me, I need some help.

I was playing Second Life last night and my system froze up and wouldn't let me log off. I killed the power, but when I went to restart it just gives me a blue screen.

I've tried loading Windows in Safe Mode as well, but it just comes up blank.

I can get a DOS screen, so I think it might be the video driver in Windows is just overloaded. Is there anything I can do in DOS to fix this?

HELP!!!!

 

[v0rtex]

Originally Posted by Bradford

...when I went to restart it just gives me a blue screen.

I've tried loading Windows in Safe Mode as well, but it just comes up blank.

I can get a DOS screen, so I think it might be the video driver in Windows is just overloaded. Is there anything I can do in DOS to fix this?

What's the text on the blue screen say? Important details are any filename in the text (usually a .SYS or .DLL file), error messages or error ID numbers.

 

[skalogre]

Woah, nice. XP Pro or XP Home?
You have a few options. You could look at running a repair of XP; if you can run the recovery consile you could repair it that way also.
However, there is one more possibility. When you say the screen is blue, does it let you log in then give you a blank desktop?

 

[Bradford]

Yes - it's just a blank blue desktop - no icons visible.

Can't actually get to the select users screen so that I can log-in under an individual user.

 

[j]

You can get a DOS screen? What version of Windows are you running?

 

[Bradford]

Originally Posted by j

You can get a DOS screen? What version of Windows are you running?

XP - I think...

 

[imageWIS]

Originally Posted by Bradford

XP - I think...

You think? Oh...

Ok, first off, find out what version of Windows you are running, because there is a big difference between XP and 2000. Even XP Home and XP Pro have quite a large difference.

Jon.

 

[j]

I'd love to be a superstar here and tell you exactly what you need to do, but until we know more about it, I'll just pre-empt anyone by saying the obvious:

Buy a Mac.

 

[skalogre]

Originally Posted by j

I'd love to be a superstar here and tell you exactly what you need to do, but until we know more about it, I'll just pre-empt anyone by saying the obvious:

Buy a Mac.

OMG where is Tokyo Slim? J is trying to get him to switch to the pearlescent white side! Resist the evil, Brad

 

[Steve B.]

Can you imagine the "discussions" J and Slim have about computing?

 

[SGladwell]

Originally Posted by j

Buy a Mac.

Won't help him. He was playing a game. Maybe it's available for the Mac, but probably not. So the only thing he'd be able to do is Boot Camp his new Mac into Windows. True, then he'd have a beautiful machine. But he'd have the same garbage on the screen that he does now. If not right away, then soon enough.

 

[Brian SD]

Bradford, first step would be to open the BIOS and revert to safe/optimal settings if you have the option to do so, and see if this fixes it. If you don't have this option, don't worry about it. The next thing I would do is start yanking parts out and running on a barebones set-up. Try it with just HD / Video card / one stick of RAM... no sound card, no network card, etc. etc.. (don't bother pulling out CD drives, they're rarely ever the culprit of this issue). If it works, start putting things in one by one until it fails start up again. IMO, it sounds like a bad or burnt out part. If it was a simple video driver issue, you would still be able to get into safe mode because Win wouldn't be loading the drivers to get in. BTW, Second Life is out on Mac.

 

[Bradford]

It seems to be a Windows issue. I am running XP Home, but the problem is, I don't have a Windows disk from Microsoft.

All I have is the program/recovery disks from EMachines who manufactured my machine. If I run those to reinstall Windows, I will lose all of the data on my hard drive.

At this point, it appears the only option is to install an additional hard drive, load Windows to that drive and use it to access the hard drive with the data.

That is - unless someone else has a better idea...

 

[sonick]

Originally Posted by Bradford

It seems to be a Windows issue. I am running XP Home, but the problem is, I don't have a Windows disk from Microsoft.

All I have is the program/recovery disks from EMachines who manufactured my machine. If I run those to reinstall Windows, I will lose all of the data on my hard drive.

At this point, it appears the only option is to install an additional hard drive, load Windows to that drive and use it to access the hard drive with the data.

That is - unless someone else has a better idea...
I dont know if the recovery disks have it, but the regular versions of Windows install discs have a "repair' install option that replaces all the system files but leaving the apps/data intact, you may want to try that.

 

[j]

Originally Posted by sonick

I dont know if the recovery disks have it, but the regular versions of Windows install discs have a "repair' install option that replaces all the system files but leaving the apps/data intact, you may want to try that.
Ditto. You could also buy a full copy of XP and install a full new install on the old drive in a new directory. This would at least avoid having to buy a new hard drive.