I have a Dell Precision 340 running Windows XP Professional. Intel Pentium 4. Not very old. 1GB of RAM.
It keeps restarting after showing a quick glimpse of blue on start up. I can't read what the error is so I'm completely lost. Also I have no recovery disks.
I'm pretty sure the last thing I did was install a driver for an old HP keyboard that enables multimedia buttons and a volume control knob, then got bluescreen and now I'm stuck with this problem.
Any help would be appreciated.
Hi Daniel299
and welcome to the WTT forums.
Sorry to hear of the problems with your machine.
As a first step, restart your machine in safe mode (tap the F8 key regularly once per second immediately after power up and select safe mode from the advanced menu)
Then undo the last thing you did…uninstall the keyboard driver or use a System Restore point to restore your system to a date immediately before the problem started.
If you need detailed instructions for any of this post back and one of us here will get back to you
regards
paws
Okay. Tried - Safe mode: received blue screen.
Selected disable auto restart on system error and was able to read the error…
STOP: c000021a {Fatal System Error}
The Windows Logon Process system process terminated unexpectedly with a status of 0x0000135 (000000000 0x00000000).
The system has been shut down.
Oh yeah. I also tried a diagnostics test on the BIOS under the Windows Blue Screen category and also the category that says something like Can't Boot OS.
All tests passed.
Hi , I understand.
I hope your back up/copy /archive of all your important stuff is 100% up to date accurate, reproducible and kept safe on removable media….. if for any reason it's not, then this must be your number 1 priority.
(If you need any help with this…. booting into Linux, or removing hard drive and using another machine or Ext USB caddy….post back for detailed instructions)
When all your important stuff is safely copied to removable media then try this:
Start your machine with the Microsoft Windows XP CD installation disc in the CD/DVD drivebay, select the option to setup XP, when it highlights your Windows XP partition, choose R to repair XP. and see how you go:
If your machine won't start up from the disc (you may have to try a number of times) then you will need to set the boot priority in the BIOS to Optical drive CD/DVD as number 1
Hard disc O as number 2 and floppy drive (if fitted as Number 3…(any network drive should come last)
Post back if you need more detailed instructions
Regards
paws
I'm sorry, perhaps you didn't understand. I have no disks for this computer. I would have tried this. And the ctrl+f11 recovery isn't supported by the Precision workstations.
If it helps at all…
The computer tries to load agp440.sys, then fails with a blue screen when I try to boot it in safe mode, or any other mode from the f8 list.
Start the computer by using the last known good configuration. To start the computer by using the last known good configuration, follow these steps:Note Because there are several versions of Microsoft Windows, the following steps may be different on your computer. If they are, see your product documentation to complete these steps.
Press F8 at the indicated time:
For an x86-based computer: When a screen of text appears and then disappears , press F8. (The screen of text may include a memory test, lines about the BIOS, and other lines.) There may also be a prompt that tells you when to press F8.
For an Itanium architecture-based computer: After you make your selection from the boot menu, press F8. There may be a prompt that tells you when to press F8.
Use the arrow keys to select Last Known Good Configuration, and then press ENTER. NUM LOCK must be off before the arrow keys on the numeric keypad will function.
Use the arrow keys to highlight an operating system, and then press ENTER.
Notes:
Choosing the Last Known Good Configuration startup option provides a way to recover from problems such as a newly added driver that may be incorrect for your hardware. However, it does not solve problems that are caused by corrupted or missing drivers or files.
When you choose the Last Known Good Configuration option, only the information in registry key HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet is restored. Any changes you have made in other registry keys remain.
Sorry to hear of the problems with your machine.
As a first step, restart your machine in safe mode (tap the F8 key regularly once per second immediately after power up and select safe mode from the advanced menu)
Then undo the last thing you did…uninstall the keyboard driver or use a System Restore point to restore your system to a date immediately before the problem started.
If you need detailed instructions for any of this post back and one of us here will get back to you
regards
paws