Expecting the worst...

Hello all,

Tonight when I was away we had either a power surge or a power dip, which are fairly common where I live. My PC is almost always on, and I have never had any problems before despite these occurrences. I am connected to a surge protector, but unfortunately not to a UPS (maybe this would have saved me?).

Presently my PC is in some loop where when I power it up it goes to the apology screen ("windows did not start successfully, etc.").

Options are:

1. Safe mode
2. Safe mode w/ networking
3. Safe w/ command prompt
4. Last known working config
5. Start normally

I have tried each of these, and they all lead back to Windows trying to reboot, then failing, and very, very quickly flashing to a blue error screen for a fraction of a second, then back to apology screen. I don't have time to begin to read the error message, but my undereducated guess is that either the power supply is fried or (more likely) the hard drive with Windows XP is fried or corrupted (please, no please!)

It is a Dell Dimension 4600
Pentium 4 2.6
1.5 GB RAM
Windows XP Home Edition SP2
2 Internal hard drives, 2 external hard drives

I have floppy drive but no access to floppy disks to make boot disk. I have Dell reinstall CDs, but would like to first check whether I can recover anything from the hard drive if it has failed. I do have working LAN network, and laptop.

Any ideas or suggestions so I can find out the extent of the damage and what the next step should be? Please let me know if I can provide any more information to help diagnosis. Sorry for the long post and thanks in advance for the help.

 

Thanks, Tim... I may be worse off than I thought even.
I have the Dell Windows XP home reinstall, but when I put it in the drive, it continues the same cycle as mentioned in the original post. During boot attempt I hit F12 for "Boot Device Menu", then chose "5" for IDE CD-ROM device, still with the same result. I also tried to just leave the reinstall CD in and boot normally and from safe mode from "apology" screen (is there a specific name for this this message?) Any other advice?

 

No, it stays in that weird loop. Is it not recognizing CD drive? At what point in boot process would I be in the BIOS. It starts and shows the Dell Screen with the BIOS revision (A12) and quick progress bar, then instantly to the "apology" screen with the 5 options. Does not seem to acknowledge the CD in the drive. I wish I could see what the blue error screen says, I'm sure it would help.
I am pretty sure it is the correct CD.

 

If I leave the apology screen on the default option "start windows normally," then this process keeps repeating automatically continuously after the countdown.

 

OK Tim, I tried some of your last suggestions, and now it seems to recognize the CD in the drive. It has gone to the Windows Home Edition setup... I can

1. Set up Windows XP
2. Repair XP install using Recovery Console
3. Quit setup

I assume I want to choose 2, but i am not sure about disconnecting internal hard drives, and the C drive also has the Windows OS on it. Will choosing "R", which is option 2, put me at risk of losing anything if it is still recoverable from the hard drives?

 

For future reference, controll and f eleven together for restore on Dell. ed

 

For some reason, using the Recovery Console, after I choose this option, it says, "The Recovery Console provides system repair and recovery functionality. Type exit to quit the Recovery Console and restart the computer. Then, based on the link Tim Provided, I gather it is supposed to offer me a valid windows installation choice by number. All I get is a C:\> prompt... not sure what this means but it can't be good.

 

BTW, is there any way to freeze the blue error screen so I can tell exactly what the problem is? Seems like that should be a no-brainer lol!

 

I just ran the IDE Drive Diagnostics, and it showed that my primary IDE (Maxtor 6E040L0) failed. The return code is 7. I don't see the other internal hard drive listed (the one that windows is not installed on), but I do see that it lists as Secondary IDE my CD-R/RW and DVD-ROM drives, but they say "diagnostics not supported".

At this point is there any way to view the contents of the hard drive to see if there is anything salvageable? I guess I am not sure where to go from here.

 

At the recovery prompt, where on the short-media link it appears it is supposed to ask you which Windows installation you would like to log onto, for me it doesn't provide any option, all it does is give a C: prompt, from which I can either a) exit back to the Vacuum loop or b) help for DOS commands.

I looked at the DOS commands and tried to view the C directory with c:dir command. At first it gave an error message, then I tried to look at the D directory the same way, which worked fine. Afterwards, I tried the C again and was able to view the entire directory, which I felt was slightly more positive. At this point I didn't have any internet access to this forum or any other resources, so I looked at the list of DOS commands and tried chkdsk on both drives. At first it failed on the C drive, some error message for no valid installation of Windows found. It worked fine for D drive, so I tried again on C drive and it completed... with many errors. BUT (big ole BUT) after that it rebooted and went into the Windows interface for CHKDSK, which ran and completed after a very long time (with lots of errors, apparently it said at the finish), then Windows miraculously loaded up and everything SEEMS to be fine. In My Computer I can access the C and D drives and the few files I have looked at appear to be fine. I am afraid to try to reboot or run programs or anything that might send me back into the Vacuum Loop sequence again. Any way to know how much or what the damage actually was? I don't wanna say I dodged a bullet, because there may be some issue waiting to bite me.

So, a long winded way of saying thanks to you kind folks who have helped, hopefully this was what you had intended for me to do in the first place. If I understand correctly (it seems that when I go into the C and D directories in Windows that I have access to the data) the next step is to hurriedly copy any necessary or important data from the C drive to my backup external drive, install a good copy of Windows XP on the 2nd internal (D) drive, then reformat the C drive and start with a fresh Windows install on C. I have also been advised to try to if possible only keep Windows and Windows-related files on the C drive (it is only a 40 GB drive) and keep other important install files, media, documents, program files and application data, etc. on a non-Windows drive... is this sound advice? I also would like to make a public service announcement to all to once again make sure and not be too lazy or uninformed to back up your important data before its too late. I haven't looked around but hopefully that link that Tim provided in this thread is a sticky somewhere. Still don't know exactly what happened or why (except power surges/dips) but glad to be computing again!