XP Startup Problem

Trying to sort out a sick laptop for a friend, it boots into the XP startup screen then into "starting windows" then I get a BSOD with the following fault code.

STOP: c000021a {fatal system error}
The windows logon process system process terminated unexpectedly with a status of 0xc0000005
(0x00000000 0x000000000) The system has been shut down.

Can anybody point me in the right direction on this? The machine does the same thing whilst booting into safe mode and last known good configuration has also failed.

Thanks in advance.

Ian

 

Do you have the recovery cds to repair windows with

 

Did you recently install any critical updates? The following updates may be the cause of your problem: KB893066, KB890923, KB890859 and KB893086.

 

I have the XP CD but I went into recovery and it did nothing.

 

Knowing the user of this machine I would be very surprised if any critical updates have been downloaded

 

Is this XP Home or XP Professional?

[EDIT] Also did your firend install any device drivers, system service, or third-party application recently. [/EDIT]

 

XP Home. The laptop is an emachine M5116, I don't think that will help.
I think I'm going to extract the HDD, try to get any of the files off it and re-install, pain in the ass I know but I don't really see a way around it................God I hate laptops!!!!!!

 

There are a few things that can cause the problem your friend is expriencing; a device driver, system service, or third-party application. System file mismatch caused by partially restoring the system from backup media might cause this error; some backup programs do not restore files that they determine are in use.

We can uninstall drivers and third party applications from the recovery console. If SYSTEM account permissions were altered, that can be fixed by performing a parallel Windows XP Professional installation onto a separate partition or drive.

If you think a clean install of the sytem is necessary, then by all means do just that.