Reinstall question

[raygunpk]

My cousin asks me to format her Acer laptop, which has just one drive but split into two partitions. She has important files on her D: drive and I tell her it's okay to just format the C: and make it bootable. She has Vista.

So I boot up a Windows XP CD and go to the select partition part. There's a C:, D: and an F: which seems to be a hidden partition with just Acer recovery files and utilities. I delete the C and F and make a new one...

All goes smooth, I get to the initial setup screen where you can set your user name, workgroup name, etc. After that reboot though I get a blue screen and it will just be on a restarting loop.

I googled a bit on this and a lot of people were saying it was a partition problem and it should be a fresh install...

Is that the case here? And if so, how do I get those important files out of her D: drive partition? Should I have used a Vista install instead of XP or does that not matter?

Thanks guys!

 

[Raduque]

Why didn't you just do a system restore? Why did you delete the restore partition? Even if you didn't want Vista anymore, you should NEVER delete the restore partition - it's the best way to revert if you're ever going to sell the machine.

What is the BSOD referencing? Have you tried a safe mode boot? Did you try to simply format the existing partitions or did you actually delete them? You may have changed the partition order and ended up putting the C: boot partition at the end of the drive. I don't know how that'll effect it.

Oh, and to get the files: http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16817193034

 

[VinDSL]

Originally posted by: raygunpk

Should I have used a Vista install instead of XP or does that not matter?

Laptops require specific drivers. The drivers for XP and Vista are different...

Many times, you can't put XP on a Vista lappy, because XP drivers aren't available.

LoL!

Does that make sense - I'm so tired I'm about to pass out...

 

[raygunpk]

Yes that makes sense, I also deleted the Acer recovery partition so what can I do now?

 

[BlueAcolyte]

Ask Acer for a restore disk? Or buy Vista.

 

[Onund]

To recover the files you can also try booting into a linux live CD (ubuntu, knoppix...). Hopefully linux will be able to see your partitions and you can dump the files onto an external drive or over a network somewhere.

Also, what SP of XP is your install disk? You may have better luck if you try using SP3. You can slipstream SP3 into Windows XP, there are lots of instructions on the internet for doing this, just google windows xp slipstream.

 

[VinDSL]

Originally posted by: raygunpk
Yes that makes sense, I also deleted the Acer recovery partition so what can I do now?

Heh! I slept for 10 hours...

Anyway, if it was me, I think I'd mosey over to the Acer site and see if XP drivers are available for that particular model.

If they aren't I wouldn't mess around with installing XP.

Given enough time and effort, you might be able to get XP running on it using some other manufacturer's drivers, because lappys are generic these days. For instance, I'm running a Dell (Alps) touchpad driver on my Toshiba lappy, because the Dell driver has more features - but, it took me months of trial n' error figuring out WHICH Dell touchpad driver would work with my particular model of Toshiba.

I *imagine* it's rather embarrassing having this happen to your cousin's lappy - gotta be a Murphy's Law about that somewhere - and you probably don't have months to deal with XP issues, sooo...

Check for XP drivers, and if they don't exist, take the easy way out and reinstall Vista - that's my suggestion.

 

[raygunpk]

Yea I am going to just go with another Vista install.

Thank you guys for your help!