A
aRenegade
In a normal start up after pressing the power button the hard drive comes to
life (activity LED flashing) the BIOS screen comes on for a few seconds,
fades out at the same time as the Windows XP logo screen with the "running"
light, fades in. After a few seconds that screen fades to black and after
another second or two the mouse pointer appears in the center of the screen.
Meanwhile the hard drive is working while all this activity is going on, you
can hear it plus the activity LED is flashing. After a few seconds of
looking at this black void with a mouse pointer, the blue logon screen fades
in and prompts for the user logon password (hard drive activity LED turns
off). Enter a password, the hard drive activity LED comes on, the desktop
appears and all is well.
The problem I’m having now is when the mouse pointer appears in the black
screen that’s as far as it goes. The hard drive stops spinning (no activity
LED) and the only thing I can do at that point is move the mouse pointer
around inside that black void.
I’ve tried to start in Safe Mode, Safe Mode with Networking, and Safe Mode
with Command Prompt. Each time I got the same result, a black screen with
only the words "Safe Mode" in each corner of the display, at the top center
of the screen the words, "Microsoft (R) Windows XP (R) (Build
2600.xpsp.050329-1536: Service Pack 2)", and the mouse pointer would be in
the center of the display and I can move it around.
I’ve tried the repair procedure using my reinstallation disk and after the
reboot, same outcome. I ran chkdsk, chkdsk /r, and chkdsk /p (even though I
knew that /r covers that). I’d get a notification that chkdsk found some
errors and made corrections, but when I rebooted the outcome was the same.
The Windows logo fades to black, mouse pointer in the center of the screen
that I can move around.
I did notice however, when I typed in the listsvc command in the recovery
console there were not any services that were marked as enabled. The
majority of them were listed as disabled with most of the rest being listed
as manual and a few were auto.
What I’m desperately trying to figure out is how to repair the operating
system to get back to my desktop without wiping out the My Documents folder.
Erasing personal settings I can live with but losing amassed Word, Excel, and
Outlook doc’s, *.pdf’s, *.png’s, *.jpg’s, an assortment of downloaded program
files and such would be devastating.
I’ve read "When Havoc Strikes" by Charles White
(http://webcast.broadcastnewsroom.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=8658) but
I’m leary at best with trying his procedure. And given the mispell in his
article where "because" is spelled "becuase" I am even less inclined to risk
the fate of my documents with his instructions. A Homer Simpson "Dooh" I
don’t exactly need after seemingly endless days and nights of trying to
figure out how to get out of the mess I put myself in.
I was able to run hardware diagnostics and all of those tests passed. If I
were, or could do a clean install without repartitioning the hard drive would
that save the My Documents folder along with its contents? Any assistance
would not only be appreciated, I would say novena’s on anyone’s behalf for
the next 365 days.
life (activity LED flashing) the BIOS screen comes on for a few seconds,
fades out at the same time as the Windows XP logo screen with the "running"
light, fades in. After a few seconds that screen fades to black and after
another second or two the mouse pointer appears in the center of the screen.
Meanwhile the hard drive is working while all this activity is going on, you
can hear it plus the activity LED is flashing. After a few seconds of
looking at this black void with a mouse pointer, the blue logon screen fades
in and prompts for the user logon password (hard drive activity LED turns
off). Enter a password, the hard drive activity LED comes on, the desktop
appears and all is well.
The problem I’m having now is when the mouse pointer appears in the black
screen that’s as far as it goes. The hard drive stops spinning (no activity
LED) and the only thing I can do at that point is move the mouse pointer
around inside that black void.
I’ve tried to start in Safe Mode, Safe Mode with Networking, and Safe Mode
with Command Prompt. Each time I got the same result, a black screen with
only the words "Safe Mode" in each corner of the display, at the top center
of the screen the words, "Microsoft (R) Windows XP (R) (Build
2600.xpsp.050329-1536: Service Pack 2)", and the mouse pointer would be in
the center of the display and I can move it around.
I’ve tried the repair procedure using my reinstallation disk and after the
reboot, same outcome. I ran chkdsk, chkdsk /r, and chkdsk /p (even though I
knew that /r covers that). I’d get a notification that chkdsk found some
errors and made corrections, but when I rebooted the outcome was the same.
The Windows logo fades to black, mouse pointer in the center of the screen
that I can move around.
I did notice however, when I typed in the listsvc command in the recovery
console there were not any services that were marked as enabled. The
majority of them were listed as disabled with most of the rest being listed
as manual and a few were auto.
What I’m desperately trying to figure out is how to repair the operating
system to get back to my desktop without wiping out the My Documents folder.
Erasing personal settings I can live with but losing amassed Word, Excel, and
Outlook doc’s, *.pdf’s, *.png’s, *.jpg’s, an assortment of downloaded program
files and such would be devastating.
I’ve read "When Havoc Strikes" by Charles White
(http://webcast.broadcastnewsroom.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=8658) but
I’m leary at best with trying his procedure. And given the mispell in his
article where "because" is spelled "becuase" I am even less inclined to risk
the fate of my documents with his instructions. A Homer Simpson "Dooh" I
don’t exactly need after seemingly endless days and nights of trying to
figure out how to get out of the mess I put myself in.
I was able to run hardware diagnostics and all of those tests passed. If I
were, or could do a clean install without repartitioning the hard drive would
that save the My Documents folder along with its contents? Any assistance
would not only be appreciated, I would say novena’s on anyone’s behalf for
the next 365 days.