halfshadows
Junior Member
I wanted to post what happened to me this last week because of how bizarre it was and also to find out if anyone has ever heard of anything like it or has any inkling what might have happened.
After an upgrade to my motherboard, processor, and memory, I reformatted my 200GB HD (Seagate, newly purchase last Spring) and reinstalled Windows XP Pro and all of my programs. Before installing Windows, I disconnected the system from the internet and before I reconnected, I reinstalled SP2 from a CD and installed AVG Anti-Virus.
By the next day, I had Windows and most of my programs reinstalled and my documents folders restored from a backup. One of the final programs I had to install was Flash MX 2004. I mention this program by name not because I think it had anything to do with the crash, but as a way of saying that as a stable and well-tested commercial application, it probably had nothing do with it.
I then restarted. Windows hangs during the blue loading screen. I hard re-boot. I select Start in Safe Mode when the choice comes up. I opt not to use System Restore once safe mode is loaded and go to the Check Disk by way of Disk (C) > Properties > Tools > Error-checking > Check Now. Windows reboots to Check Disk screen. Disk Check runs through to about 75% of Step 5 and hangs. I leave it for a half hour to make sure it is crashed and not just taking a while. I hard re-boot. The "Start in Safe Mode" DOS screen comes up...I select Safe Mode. A bunch of items load and then the screen just goes blank and the whole system reboots. I tried every option in the "Start in Safe Mode" screen such as "Start with Last Known Working Configuration" and "Start Windows Normally". Same thing. I pop in the Windows XP Pro CD to do a repair of Windows. I go into Windows System Recovery tool. No installations of Windows found to fix. I tried a HD error checking and data recovery tool called SpinRite at both level 2 and level 5 and it reported no errors on the disk. In DOS, there is no Windows directory on the drive.
The thing I'm worried about most now is that since I have no idea what happened, how do I know it won't happen again? Is this just a freak occurance?
After an upgrade to my motherboard, processor, and memory, I reformatted my 200GB HD (Seagate, newly purchase last Spring) and reinstalled Windows XP Pro and all of my programs. Before installing Windows, I disconnected the system from the internet and before I reconnected, I reinstalled SP2 from a CD and installed AVG Anti-Virus.
By the next day, I had Windows and most of my programs reinstalled and my documents folders restored from a backup. One of the final programs I had to install was Flash MX 2004. I mention this program by name not because I think it had anything to do with the crash, but as a way of saying that as a stable and well-tested commercial application, it probably had nothing do with it.
I then restarted. Windows hangs during the blue loading screen. I hard re-boot. I select Start in Safe Mode when the choice comes up. I opt not to use System Restore once safe mode is loaded and go to the Check Disk by way of Disk (C) > Properties > Tools > Error-checking > Check Now. Windows reboots to Check Disk screen. Disk Check runs through to about 75% of Step 5 and hangs. I leave it for a half hour to make sure it is crashed and not just taking a while. I hard re-boot. The "Start in Safe Mode" DOS screen comes up...I select Safe Mode. A bunch of items load and then the screen just goes blank and the whole system reboots. I tried every option in the "Start in Safe Mode" screen such as "Start with Last Known Working Configuration" and "Start Windows Normally". Same thing. I pop in the Windows XP Pro CD to do a repair of Windows. I go into Windows System Recovery tool. No installations of Windows found to fix. I tried a HD error checking and data recovery tool called SpinRite at both level 2 and level 5 and it reported no errors on the disk. In DOS, there is no Windows directory on the drive.
The thing I'm worried about most now is that since I have no idea what happened, how do I know it won't happen again? Is this just a freak occurance?
