Geek seeking Geek advice!!

[Ginger]

Biting the bullet as I type, will let you know the outcome later 

  damn pc's,  grrrrrrrrrrr

Thanks for all the help guys 

[TheJagster]

Its my pleasure....anytime     

Have you checked the fuse?

[M3boy]

Most likely cause is a faulty Hard Drive.

A word of advise, you will prob be able to reformat the HD and load windows again, this will work for a while, but you will run into the same problem in the not too distant future.

I used to have the same problem on one of our PC's - now have a new hard drive with windows installed, users setup, programs installed, restrictions for what the kids can and cant do.

That Hard drive is now secure in its box, only to be used to copy onto existing hard drive - saves me around 5 hours time when the PC crashes.

[Ginger]

Ok, it's crunch time ......

started over from scratch AGAIN, OS installed and have downloaded SP2 from another location......

I am about to do the first reboot,  watch this space..............

fingers crossed everyone!

[RED-DOG]

If it doesn't work this time Ginge, make some tea and let a bloke fix it

[madasahatstand]

sounds like shes got it in hand big chap. cheeky beggar!!

mad

[Ginger]

 

need I say more?

[Solver]

Wow,

This is the first I've heard of SP2 actually stopping a PC from booting.

My laptop is running with SP2 but I'm happy with my PC has been running with no SP's evers since I got it.  I'm happy that my Firewall router and security programs are pluggin the security flaws.

Go without it.

Stu

[Ginger]

Looks like I will have to do just that Solver, it DID install, the little yellow line changed to the little blue one even lol.

It looked like it was going to load, I got the windows XP screen, which I didn't last time, it then got stuck in a reboot loop, getting so far then restarting itself. I had to in the end switch it off. That's when I got the damn black screen again 

I'm at a loss as to what's wrong, it's certainly a new one to me. I had to do a reformat last year, just after SP2 came out ( nothing to do with SP2 though) and it was fine, so why would there be problems this time?

[ifm]

Try this please.
Boot the comp and then tap F8 till you get the bios menu, in the menu there should be an option to change disable "automatic restart on system failure", this should result in you getting a blue screen next time it fails to boot and from the error may give you a clue as to the fault

[ifm]

Just did a quick search and most of these kind of problems are due to BIOS errors, the conventional wisdom appears to be to load up XP then flash the BIOS and then install SP2.

[Ginger]

IFM, thanks again for help, in fact all of you.

I've tried just about every option and STILL get the black screen as soon as it tries to move on. What do you mean "flash the BIOS"?

[ifm]

upgrade the BIOS = flash it.
There were apparently conflicts with SP2:-

http://techrepublic.com.com/5100-1035_11-5330486.html#

[Ginger]

Cheers IFM, I'll have a go at that later, right now I've had enough of the damn thing lol.

[bundle]

Have you tried Dropping it, or throwing it against a wall?

If that don’t work you are going to need a HAMMER