Can't boot up

I have a Premier pc that I aquired from my father after his passing a few years ago. I have given it to my kids and now its ******* up and won't boot up.It has Windows Me installed on it. A few days ago my kids said it wasn't working...when they clicked on IE to get on the internet it wouldn't load so I was going to uninstall IE and reinstall it.Well,when I tried to restart the pc it won't start in normal mode...wants to start in safe mode...but when it boots in safe mode,there is nothing on the desk top but the "safe mode" in each corner.One thing that I notice when its booting up...it says error detected in registry...run scanreg.....how do i do this? I have no disks that may have come with the pc.

 

You probably will need a technician to look at it. From experience as one myself, the most common causes for repeated corrupt registry messages on boot are these (Most common 1st)

> Faulty RAM
> Bad sectors and therefore faulty hard disk
> A virus

To tell you all the things to try would take a huge amount of time and writing, and undertanding it will require some I.T experience.

Anyway that's my opinion. Good Luck!

 

How to Start the System Restore Tool from a Command Prompt

 

Sorry it took so long to get back to this,was away for a bit....anyways...I don't have a boot disk...but when I boot up it gives me the 4 choices of 1)NORMAL 2)LOGGED(\BOOTLOG.TXT) 3)SAFE MODE 4)STEP BY STEP CONFIGURATION....If I do choice 3 or 4 it will go to desktop but with nothing on it. Normal doesn't work. What is choice two?How do I get to a screen that I can type commands?...I want to try something like Mark's suggestion but I don't know where to find "Minimum Boot ".I found a site that lets you create boot disks but nothing happens when its in the pc.

I also want to add that in my original post I stated "I wanted to uninstall IE ",to clear matters I did indeed uninstall IE.I'm sure thats the problem and not a virus.

 

Anyone?

 

Rackster,

Two ways to get a ME boot disk http://www.bootdisk.com/ Read the thread or http://www.bootdisk.com/ download one for ME.

Regards - Charles

 

Still think you are all ignoring the fact he probably has a hardware fault causing the problem. If you dont fix that, you wont get anywhere.

 

Hello Dez,

Not ignoring it - trying to pin it down. You may well be right, but restoring is cheap to try first.

Regards - Charles

 

Ok...I downloaded the file onto my hp computer running xp.The directions say to insert a "fresh floppy" and click on the file.This will extract the files to the floppy? It won't mess up my hp computer,will it? Then I'm assuming I just put it in the problem pc and turn it on?

 

Hello Rackster,

This will extract the files to the floppy?
Yes.

It won't mess up my hp computer,will it?
I can't imagine why it would.

Then I'm assuming I just put it in the problem pc and turn it on?
Yes. I'm assuming that the floppy is the first boot device in the BIOS - meaning that the system, if it finds a boot floppy will boot w/o trying to access the HD first. If it doesn't do that, post back.

Regards - Charles

 

Well I tried to do it and it didn't work...keeps doing the same thing,wants to start in safe mode and when its loaded there are no icons on desktop.It doesn't even seem to acknowledge the floppy disk.


Mark....in your link it says To start the System Restore tool when you cannot start your Windows Me-based computer normally or in Safe mode, you can temporarily change the Windows shell from Explorer.exe to Progman.exe: 1) Start your computer by using the Windows Me Startup disk. Well what do you do if the start up disk doesn't start it properly to let me give a command prompt?

 

Hi Rackster,

The Bios is not set up to read the floppy as the first boot device. You're going to have to go into the Bios and set the floppy to be the primary boot device.

On boot up, hit the F10 or Esc key to get into the BIOS.

Regards - Charles

 

This didn't work either....is there any other way to get into the BIOS besides the F10 or ESC keys? When I tried this it went to the 4 options of Normal,Safe,Logged,or Step by Step.

 

If you are getting the boot options menu like safe mode etc.. you are past where you get into BIOS. You have to start tapping the appropriate key pretty much as soon as you start the PC, during the POST. Often the PC will tell you which key is for entering setup (BIOS), unless it is on silent boot.

Other keys used for bios are many but most common are:

Delete (del), F10, F1 and F2

See how you go.

 

I know of some systems that use F12, tab, ctrl, and others...

 

F10 was the correct key and the floppy was the first boot device but it didn't work.... even tho I didn't change anything when I boot up now it states Floppy disk(s) fail (40).....and at the bottom of screen it says press F1 to continue or DEL to enter setup. F1 brings me back to the 4 options and setup is the cmos page which has the bios settings.

Could the floppy disk itself be the problem? Or the drive?

Is it now a hardware problem?

I really don't think its a virus because the kids don't really go on the internet or have e-mail except to go to disney.com

Would pc doctor help me with this problem?

 

Hi Rackster,

Could the floppy disk itself be the problem? Or the drive?
This exercise was to try and pin down whether it was hardware or not. You can try another floppy in case the one you used was bad.

At this point, don't know what to tell you - there is Dez Bradley's option which is taking the computer in for repair.

Regards - Charles

 

Tried a different floppy but had same results....time for the shop I guess...Thanks to all that helped!