It looks like there are several causes for your error - all of them impossible to fix, if you can't gain access to your machine.

Can you boot from the ME disk? If not, do you GET the same error?

Does the system have a floppy drive?

If you can't gain access to your machine, all that I can think of is to pull the hdd, put it into another machine and reformat it. Potentially dangerous to the other system if your hdd is infected, but, I think, OKAY if the only activity would be to format the bad drive. I would want confirmation from the forum malware experts, though, before I moved the drive to another system.thanks for your help. i'm getting more than a little frustrated with this computer. i'm giving up on it for today and i'll try again tomorrow. i'm still LOOKING for advice. can anyone help me?I can't believe the Mickey Mouse bad advice I'm seeing given out here.

So you have another computer you can get to, that's great. Because what you need to do is take the hard drive out of the computer that wont run, put it into the computer you are on now, and copy all of your files that you want to keep onto it. Dont worry about the adware infecting this computer, that's not very likely at all.

If you don't know how to do this, the best advice I can give you to try is to plug this harddrive into the same cable that the CD/DVD rom on the working computer is using. Otherwise, you need to learn about Master and Slave and jumpers on hard drives.

So your data is saved. Now to get an operating system back on your other computer. That part isnt so easy without an XP installation disc, and I have no experience with an upgrade disc so have no idea what to suggest there. Other than to get one any way you can. You can forget about the existing installation being fixed, it's not worth the time or trouble, a clean install is the best thing you can do.

It isn't likely the system is going to boot to an upgrade disc, try booting to the ME install disc and go from there. Quote from: jmjcari on July 27, 2008, 04:58:53 PM

thanks for your help. i'm getting more than a little frustrated with this computer. i'm giving up on it for today and i'll try again tomorrow.

I can't believe the Mickey Mouse bad advice I'm seeing given out here.

i'll recommend you to use safe mode

sorry i should have clarified...it doesn't start in normal mode, safe mode, or last know good configuration.