I'm working on a friend's computer so I don't know all the specs what I do know is this:
e-machines computer
1 GB RAM
100 GB HDD
Windows XP Home
I think it's a AMD Sempron processor not sure the speed.

Problem is the machine powers up then shows an "Invalid BOOT.INI" message then tries to restart and will continue this loop unless manually powered down. 

I can not boot to safe mode

The BIOS can detect the HDD and other components and I don't see ANYTHING out of the ordinary

I've checked all connections and cables both internal and external and did not find anything wrong

And of course he never made a recovery disk and does not have one, nor do I have one available.

Any and all suggestions are welcome.

Thanks in advanceI had the same problem just about 1 week ago. It turns out that the HD went bad. Can you slave the HD to another computer to check it out?I will try thatI was able to slave the HDD to a know good system, the drive seems to function and all the data seems to be there.  While I had it slaved to the other drive I was able to fix the Boot.ini file.  When I reinstalled the drive in the original system I now get a message saying the Hal.dll file is corrupt or missing.

Any suggestions?

Thanks.I would start by pulling all the data off the drive.

Next go to the manufactures web SITE and get the free tool to check the drive. This will let you test it and see if its really bad.

The corrupt boot.ini and missing hal.dll are related...
See This Fix.Patio,

I TRIED the fixes in the link you supplied, no luck

I went so far as to remove the HDD from a good system that was going to be scrapped and installing it in the system that was giving me problems.  I was able to boot into safe mode but it would not boot normally.

Could there be a problem with the BIOS, mother board, power supply that would lead to such a condition?

ThanksYou can't simply TAKE a HDD from one machine and expect it to boot in another...XP makes sure of this.
Reason is it is searching for the drivers from the machine it was installed on...
As far as diagnosing what could be at fault we need more info on what led up to this dilemna...