I have a huge problem with my laptop which runs on Windows XP. Last night I realised that I had never re-installed Service Pack 2 after we had Windows restored earlier in the year. I downloaded SP2 in 30 minutes or so, but the install took ages and then eventually failed. It started to uninstall itself and was taking a long time. It was late and I thought that it had froze so I decided to just turn my laptop off. This morning the computer would not boot up in either normal mode, safe mode or last good configuration mode.

I would just use one of the restore CDs which shipped with the computer, but for an unknown reason my DVD drive will not read CDs and hasn't for a while now, so that is not an option. I really would like to salvage all my data if possible as the computer contains a lot of music for all my family, and also my GCSE work. Most of the latter is backed up, but hardly anything else is as without the possibility of backing up onto CDs, I only have a limited 128MB USB Memory Stick. We also have lots of digital photographs on the computer - not all of which have been printed or are stored anywhere else.

I was just wondering if anyone will be able to give me any advice, as all help will be very much appreciated.

I was also wondering if restoring from the hard drive will cause me to lose everything on the C drive.

Thank you.

Cathy

well for now i think it was a bad idea to shutdown your laptop during an important setup like that, i think you will have to re-install your entire windows xp operating system, i think it would be possible to recover your files you had on the hard drive. If you could invest in an external bootable CD ROM drive or if you can borrow or use one, you could be able to setup XP again on your laptop from the cd's you have, unless you get that cd-rom drive working. Try cleaning the lens with a cleaning kit or try to blow off any dust on it, Does it spin wen you insert a CD? If you get the cd-rom working when you get to the install screen, try to select "repair current operating system" or any option that appears like that. If you still have no luck, just do a fresh new re-install

If cleaning your DVD/CD drive doesn't work you might consider getting a new one. It is a fairly vital part of your machine.

Another solution to accessing your data is pulling the hard drive & with an adapter hook it up to a PC as slave & get your data. This article explains that process:

http://techrepublic.com.com/5100-1035_11-5160538.html#

Thank you both very much for your help.

Cathy

Thanks for the thanks! Let us know how you get on.

We took our laptop into a computer repair shop and they managed to save all my files and we also got a new DVD drive, so thanks again for all your help.

Cathy

Glad you got sorted!

Let us know if we can help further in the future!

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