On a Dell Inspiron 1150 laptop five years old, 1 Gig of Ram running Windows XP Pro, I get a blue screen at boot up each time I boot up. The blue screen appears after the Dell Splash Screen and after the "Windows Loading Screen.
The message on the screen says: Unmountable_Boot_Volume. Disable or remove any newly installed hardware or software. Disable Bios such as caching or shadowing. Use safe mode if needed to perform these tasks. Press F8.
Tech info
Stop: 0x000000ED
0x8772E900,0xc000000c,0x00000000, 0x00000000
I have not installed any new hardware or software.
The hard drive in this laptop is the original one, so it is five years old.
I have not done anything to fix this. I have had very good luck fixing two other computers that had multiple infections, so I hope this is the right forum for this problem. I have located an installation disk from my other XP Pro (also from Dell) but don't know if the laptop will allow using another installation disc. All data is backed up on Carbonite. Any ideas?
Run the chkdsk /r command from recovery console, pay attention to messages about bad clusters, and go from there. You might be able to get a little more life out of the system, or even continue without further problems after this.
Thanks for your reply, I wanted to let you know that I was called tro work out of town so I can't get to my notebook as quisk as I would like. I should be able to get to it by Thursday, the 28th. I don't want to lose my place in line. Thanks.
John
I found a reinstall disk for win xp pro that came with another Dell computer. I used the recovery console and the problem has been corrected. Thanks for your help!
john
I plan to replace the HD because it is over 5 years old. Is their anything I can do now to prepare for this? I understand that I will have to reinstall windows, drivers, apps, etc. Can you direct me to a realible link for instructions?
No need to reinstall anything. Put the new drive in as a Slave, then use CloneCD to clone the old drive to the new one. Stick with the free version. It runs slower, capped at 2 MB/sec I think, but it does the job.
Remove the old drive and make the new drive Master and boot. System should come right up with everything intact.
The computer is a notebook. When the old drive is removed there is no cable attached. I understand what you are saying and could apply it to a desktop, but I don't see how I could power two drives with one slot to accept one drive. the computer is an Dell Inspiron 1150. Please clarify. Thanks
Sorry, I missed the fact you were using a notebook.
In that case, you could use backup software like Acronis True Image ($50) or free like Macrium Reflect Free Edition toi make and image backup to an external hard drive then swap hard drives and restore to the new drive.
This means you would have to buy an external USB 2.0 hard drive if you don't have one, but that would be a good idea anyway as you would then be able to use it for normal backups so your data will be safe in the future.
I bought a USB 2.0 external drive enclosure (ENCLSR 3.5" USB2.0 AMS DS-2316B2BK - with fan) and a 500GB IDE hard drive to put in it several years ago and have been using it to backup my Desktop and Laptop systems on a regular basis.
John