(I thought I'd posted this earlier but it appears not have gone through)

 

I had a dual boot linux and windows xp machine. that is until i decided to

get rid of linux. i removed the linux partitions and was then presented

something called grub on every subsequent startup, and i couldn't boot

windows.

 

i used the xp install cd to boot and selected recovery, and after a bit of

fun and gfames i ran fixmbr. the fun and games entailed the restore

seemingly doing an install, which ocnfused and worried me. during its

"recory" it complained about a number of files missing, so i had no choice

other than to ignore the warnings and continue.

 

eventually after finally finishing its "recovery" act, it booted and to my

releif windows started to boot. it took (and still does) a very long time to

progress from the "windows is loading" blue screen (just before the list of

log in users is presented). again to my releif the list of my user names was

presented, so i was in hope that everything would work as i'd expect.

 

unfortunately, xp now no longer recognises my agp ati radeon 9800 adapter,

it just thinks its a generic dispaly adapter. i can't update the display

drivers as windows complains. also, although all my data is in tact, i can't

run a num,ber of programs properly.

 

my display is now huge as i can't change the resolution easily as my ati

drivers won;t install. activesync won't recognise my phone, musicmatch won't

run properly and aborts, and orb won't start.

 

so my pc is not in a good place.

interestingly when i tried connecting my phone, it recognised it as new

hardware but then complained about a sys file that it couldn't find even

though it was in system32/drivers. so i selected the file in the said

directory and it stoppedcomplaining, although activesync still fails to

recognise my phone.

 

so, all in all, i seem to have gone a bit wrong. things like word still

run, as obviously does my browser and internet connection, but my pc is not

in a good place.

 

assistance would be very much appreciated. as mentioned also, my pc is

taking an inordinate amount of time on the blue "windows is starting" screen.

 

regards,

 

Dan

All that was needed was a W98 boot disk. http://www.bootdisk.com

boot from floppy and type * fdisk /mbr *. It is hard to tell what

you may have changed while in recovery...

 

Dan K wrote:

> (I thought I'd posted this earlier but it appears not have gone

> through)

>

> I had a dual boot linux and windows xp machine. that is until i

> decided to get rid of linux. i removed the linux partitions and was

> then presented something called grub on every subsequent startup, and

> i couldn't boot windows.

>

> i used the xp install cd to boot and selected recovery, and after a

> bit of fun and gfames i ran fixmbr. the fun and games entailed the

> restore seemingly doing an install, which ocnfused and worried me.

> during its "recory" it complained about a number of files missing, so

> i had no choice other than to ignore the warnings and continue.

>

> eventually after finally finishing its "recovery" act, it booted and

> to my releif windows started to boot. it took (and still does) a

> very long time to progress from the "windows is loading" blue screen

> (just before the list of log in users is presented). again to my

> releif the list of my user names was presented, so i was in hope that

> everything would work as i'd expect.

>

> unfortunately, xp now no longer recognises my agp ati radeon 9800

> adapter, it just thinks its a generic dispaly adapter. i can't

> update the display drivers as windows complains. also, although all

> my data is in tact, i can't run a num,ber of programs properly.

>

> my display is now huge as i can't change the resolution easily as my

> ati drivers won;t install. activesync won't recognise my phone,

> musicmatch won't run properly and aborts, and orb won't start.

>

> so my pc is not in a good place.

> interestingly when i tried connecting my phone, it recognised it as

> new hardware but then complained about a sys file that it couldn't

> find even though it was in system32/drivers. so i selected the file

> in the said directory and it stoppedcomplaining, although activesync

> still fails to recognise my phone.

>

> so, all in all, i seem to have gone a bit wrong. things like word

> still run, as obviously does my browser and internet connection, but

> my pc is not in a good place.

>

> assistance would be very much appreciated. as mentioned also, my pc

> is taking an inordinate amount of time on the blue "windows is

> starting" screen.

>

> regards,

>

> Dan