Unable to boot up laptop

Hi, I have a dell latitude d400 laptop. Was working fine, then suddenly ran a chkdsk scan. Laptop worked ok for a day after this, then I went to start it up 2 days ago and found that it wouldn't boot. It stays on a cycle of going through to the windows boot screen with the little bar then defaults back to the option screen of booting in safe mode, last known config, etc. I have tried pressing F2, F8 & F12 and rebooting in different options like safe mode, last known config, but the bavoe just keeps happening. I don't know what ot do from here. The laptop was bought as a refurbished one so I have no install discs. I could probably borrow some if need be. Windows XP service pk 3 Intel Centrino Ram 512 IE 7 Any ideas will be greatly appreciated.

Well there is 2 ways to go, you could try and get it working again, but depending on whats gone wrong this could take quite a while, as without knowing the exact cause you could be chasing ghosts, the other option is to restore it to out of the box state, as though you just got it from the shop, this will allow you to have your own name on the user account, rather than whatever you were stuck with when you got it, so it's your call as too what you want to try.

As you can't access the system (from what I can gather ?), it will be hard to do much, but the fact you ran a Chkdsk suggests you thought something may be going on ?
I would get the hard drive makers utility and run an extended scan on the hard drive, not much point spending time on sorting it out to find the drive may be dying or something, the UBCD has all the makers tools on it, otherwise you can go directly to the makers site and get just that tool from them direct, once you get the results of that scan you should be able to decide which way to go.
I doubt you will know what make hard drive you have, the easiest way to find this out is to enter the bios and see what you have listed (usually anyway), as long as you exit without saving any changes you will not do anything to the system.

The way to restore the system to out of the box is usually Ctrl + F11 with Dell's, it sounds like you were trying to find this option yourself, well some makers don't make this a visible option, others do, but thats how you access the hidden partition, assuming the store didn't wipe it, here is the link from Dell to walk you through this if thats the option you choose, hope it helps.
http://support.euro.dell.com/support/topic…nt?docid=181316

Before doing that, try the following:

Run chkdsk from Recovery Console:
You are going to have to get into BIOS Setup on your computer to set the CD/DVD drive as the first bootable device, so you can then boot your XP CD.

How you do this varies with each manufacturer. Normally you press F1, F2, F10 or Del when you see the manufacturers logo. Often there is a clue somewhere on the screen when you boot normally telling you what key to press. Some computers (most newer ones) have a key you can press (often F12) to bring up the Boot Menu from where you can select the CD/DVD drive to boot from.

If you don't have an XP CD, download and create a bootable CD from the .iso file XP Recovery Console

You don't burn the iso file itself to CD., you create a CD from the iso file using your CD burning software. There is a good freeware burner called ImgBurn which will
do this.

Boot the CD and at the first opportunity, enter R to start the Recovery Console.
Next, choose which XP installation you want to login to. Normally this will be 1.
Lastly you will be asked for the Administrator password. Just press the Enter key as the Administrator does not have a password (unless you gave it one, then you would enter it).
From the command prompt, enter: chkdsk c: /r
Allow it to complete undisturbed. It can take an hour or more depending on the size of the hard drive.

Remove the CD, type exit and the computer will reboot. Hopefully that will have fixed the problem (corrupted file system).

Hi Ztruker, I downloaded recovery console from your link. Ran dick as per your instructions. Typed exit pressed enter, black screen appeared saying no bootable devices. Went into bios to change boot order as had to change to get cd read. Exit then rebooted laptop. Dell screen came up, then windows xp screen, then black screen for a few seconds then blue screen with following message "Stopped - Unable to locate component application failed as no BASESRV found. Reinstalling the application may fix the problem" I have turned off laptop. Any ideas?

See if you can now boot to Safe Mode (F8 at boot time); If yes, then try a System Restore to a date before the problem occurred. To get to System Restore, click on Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools then System Restore.

Hi ztruker, tried to reboot in safe mode. ran to windows set up screen, hung for a few seconds then blue screen appeared with above error msg - no basesrv

Follow 8210GUYs suggestions then to restore the computer to it's factory installed state.

Before you do that, boot a Linux "Live" CD like Puppy Linux to backup your data.

See this post by Happyrck on GeeksToGo for Puppy Linux: http://www.geekstogo.com/…..=findpost&am…21#entry1197721

The link he gives is no longer valid, so use this: Puppy Linux Community - Home Get the latest version available (currently pup-431.iso) as the one he recommends is no longer easy to find.

Follow his directions for backing up your data before restoring the computer.

If you have a XP Install CD or the Dell Operating System Recovery CD you could try doing a Repair Install first, see if that fixes the problem. A Repair Install does not wipe out your data, though it would still be a good idea to back it up just in case something goes wrong.

Hi,

Sorry it's taken a while to get back to you. I have tried the following.

"Follow 8210GUYs suggestions then to restore the computer to it's factory installed state.

Before you do that, boot a Linux "Live" CD like Puppy Linux to backup your data. Couldn't back up data as I do not have a burner for laptop.

If you have a XP Install CD or the Dell Operating System Recovery CD you could try doing a Repair Install first, see if that fixes the problem. A Repair Install does not wipe out your data, though it would still be a good idea to back it up just in case something goes wrong. Tried doing a repair first so followed link but no option for doing a system repair only full install.

Did a full install (followed 8210GUY's instructions to restore to out the bax) but now computer boots up, then after a few mins laptop reboots then black screen appears with Hard Disk read Failure -
No bootable devices–strike F1 to retry boot, F2 for setting utility

Ugh, that's beginning to sound like you have a hardware (defective hard drive) problem.

As 8210GUY also said

I would get the hard drive makers utility and run an extended scan on the hard drive, not much point spending time on sorting it out to find the drive may be dying or something, the UBCD has all the makers tools on it, otherwise you can go directly to the makers site and get just that tool from them direct, once you get the results of that scan you should be able to decide which way to go.