After TRYING to reinstall XP on laptop, screen is staying blank?!?
I recently purchased a new hard drive for my laptop. I put it in and put in my xp disc ( a special one that can be used on any pc-i have a special licence) and it started to install... then froze when formatting at 48%. I tried it again, and it froze at 33%... Now when I switch on, the screen is staying blank - no matter what disc may be in it (the xp, or original, or recovery disc etc). No matter how many times i remove the battery or try again, it does the same. Not even letting me into the bios... I'm totally stuck... PLEASE HELP!

Additional Details

21 hours ago
I can't get to to the desktop. The situ is happening from the moment the power button is pressed. I AM using the mains, and have tried just battery as well, the system did start to install xp, but froze twice, and not as in for five minutes - it was frozen on a certain % for at least 30... I switch on, it is black. With disc in or out, and if plugged in or not...

21 hours ago
My disc works fine. I know that.

2 hours ago
The laptop is out of warranty - a good few years old. The old hard drive has bad sectors and makes a clicky sound. It is well and truly f****ed. But the harddrive that is NEW is of a good quality, proper brand and everything - from a trusted source.

(the above are from where i posted the question on yahoo - http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Ai0MMZm18uY2MqW5A8nwhqIgBgx.?qid=200611 01174146AA9W9tg)

What is the exact make and model of the laptop? The manufacturer might have some ideas on their site.

Do you get power at all? What exactly is happening? Have you tried removing the hard drive?

Originally Posted by jephree

What is the exact make and model of the laptop? The manufacturer might have some ideas on their site.

Do you get power at all? What exactly is happening? Have you tried removing the hard drive?

My laptop is a toshiba satellite 1620cds. I have tried it with the power on with the old hd, the new hd and no hd in... The power comes on, and it even starts to pick up/spins discs, but then they just stop, the fan stops too, and it just sits there... no bios or welcome screen or anything!

Unless you have massively upgraded these specs I don't see how XP ever ran on this laptop:

http://www.dealtime.co.uk/xPF-Toshib...S162E-18886-SP

That being said it also should not have caused any damage as far as I know.

If you remove the RAM and power on does it beep?

You'd be surprised what some people will force XP to run on Jephree - Even in the last year or so, I've seen some well-known corporates running Windows XP and some reasonably demanding applications on Celeron 450s with 64MB!