Thank you everyone for your aesome suggestions It does appear that I am not equipped to touch the PC and fool around with it Quick question, if I buy a PC with no O/S -- all I have to do is install my Windows XP, right? I have my original code from when I purchased my PC This is probably the most cost effective option for me right now Cheers!
You'll also need to install the drivers for the motherboard + peripherals... video card, printer, etc..
Yikes! Bronks suggested that I ask you for advice regarding my pc problem. Would re-installing Windows XP resolve the issue? Thanks!!!
Back of my mind, sounds suspiciously like a bad hard drive. Better back everything up important ASAP. Have a look here on corrupt reg: http://forums.techguy.org/windows-xp/540528-stop-c0000218-registry-file-failure.html
In earlier post, you mentioned a message that a certain, critical file was corrupt or missing.... and as you can't boot to possibly restore it, likely you'll need to do a fresh install of XP. If that doesn't work, then you need to look to hardware as the cause. Good luck.
Now that I try to remember what preceded this nightmare I was trading then all of a sudden, I got a pop-up message from my Norton AT saying that no files to scan (or something like that) Anyway, I turn my PC off to restart And lo and behold, my PC is unofficially dead!!
something similar happened to me a few years back. try doing a google on systemrescue cd. i seem to remember a product called bart. its freeware. essentially, it runs xp off of a cd that you have to burn from the download. this allows you to control other devices such as a thumb stick, the old hd or other storage device. this should allow you to move data from the hd on to a removable storage device like a thumb stick, which you then put on to your new pc. good luck.
http://cgi.ebay.com/Dell-Optiplex-G...ZViewItemQQptZDesktop_PCs?hash=item414c2153e2 I am not affiliated with the seller in any way. I bought one of these units for my sister-in-law to replace an obsolete office PC for her business (which was infected with a lot of viruses and malware programs). She liked it so much, she asked me to buy her 2 more. Out of the box, it's fully booted up to Windows XP in less than 30 seconds. Two Gigabytes of RAM so Windows has enough room not to swap to disk (another cause of failed hard drives is being overworked) LICENSED Windows XP Pro software with COA sticker. Weakest link is the size of the hard drive, most people's data are less than a few Gigabytes unless you're a heavy database developer or a photo/video enthusiast. I suggest getting an external drive from Costco if you are. This will save you a lot of time for $149 (no tax no shipping). All you do is reinstall your apps, copy your data from your old PC to a thumbdrive and copy back to this new PC. You say I can't copy because my PC won't boot? You can buy a kit IDE/SATA to USB. Take out your hard drive from the old/corrupted PC and plug in to the new PC's USB. You don't feel comfortable doing that? You can create a BartPE CD and boot the old pc. BartPE can recognize USB thumbdrives so you can copy your data to them. Disclaimer: I'm not responsible for any loss of data or damage resulting from my suggestions Good luck!
When you've got XP reinstalled, you should consider something in the way of system and file backup. Acronis True Image is good, especially v11 for XP (not free) Also, Macruim Reflect is reported to be good.. and it's free