xp oem will not start

I have a laptop Acer (OEM machine) and now at startup I have the missing or corrupt message.
The message Select 'r' desn't work, the Acer page appears for 1 sec, F2 brings up the appropriate screen, install the OEM disk, fllow the prompts and nothing.
Everything only finally returns to the black screen, "windows could not start....."
There is a System CD (Says bootable) disk. There is also 3 disks titled recovery CD - I understand that to use these will destroy data.

What to do please?

 

It seems your OS is corrupted. You're probably going to have to use those cd's. Or you could try the bootable disk and hope something happens.

 

This might work. Not sure as it is for a plain jane XP. So if you have XP try it.

To start your computer by using the Last Known Good Configuration feature, follow these steps:
1. Start your computer.
2. When you see the "Please select the operating system to start" message, press the F8 key.
3. When the Windows Advanced Options menu appears, use the ARROW keys to select Last Known Good Configuration (your most recent settings that worked), and then press ENTER.
4. If you are running other operating systems on your computer, use the ARROW keys to select Microsoft Windows XP, and then press ENTER.