Windows XP Troubleshooting

Keywords: Windows XP Troubleshooting, F8 is not working, CD/DVD is not working, Repair Windows XP

7 years back in 2005,When me and many of my friends bought the system when we were in 1st year of our engineering. From then till today I have helped my friends to troubleshoot their systems. My this post is dedicated to my all friends , who asked for my help and provided their systems for my experiments and having faith in me that their systems will be safe in my hand.. 😉

I hope this post will assist my friends and many more to troubleshoot following problems. I am starting with windows xp (belive me many of us still uses it 🙂 ) , soon it will be update with Windows 7 and Ubuntu. I am trying to write solutions as queries asked by my friends. Just have patient and follow all the tips and I promise you wont lose your data in any case except your hard disk is still alive and no hardware issue is there.

1. I restarted my system and it’s not working now. What to do now?

Tip 1: Restart your system and press F8. It will give you boot menu. Choose
“Start Last known good configuration”. If it works then ok , If no dont worry go on tip 2.

Tip 2: Restart your system and press F8 to enter in safe mode. Once you entered in safe mode , click on start > system> window recovery. Start window recovery on a previous date.

After restore process is complete , see whether your system is working or not. Yes congratulations… 🙂 No, don’t worry.. Try next one.

Tip 3 : Insert your windows CD (what.. you said we wont lose any data.. yes just insert your windows cd). Boot from cd , You will be asked to choose your option from three choices(I am giving only two as they are important)
1. Install Windows XP
2.Repaire your windows XP

You have to choose first option Install winodws XP (Dont ask just choose it). It will start looking for previously installed xp in your system and once it find it. It will ask if you want to:
1.Fresh install of windows xp
2. Repair previously installed xp

Now you choose second option to repair your system.Press ‘R’.

Why we did not choose in the first place.( Hey!! don’t get angry.) Reason is if we choose it earlier then we have to do all recovery process through command prompt and for that you need to have a very good knowledge. Here it will be a graphical process. Cool na.. 😉 This graphical process will be same as fresh installation of xp. But it wont wipe your hard drive. So let it be done without get panic. After completion you should see your login screen.

In my experience, it solved 95% problems for what I was asked to give help.

Update : If F8 is not working or you can not go into safe mode then also follow above tip (Tip 3)

2. Windows repair did not work. I have to format my hard drive. But I have important data in C: drive. What to do now.

Tip: Never ever leave your important data in your C drive.

But you know your friends never listen. Anyway do not be panic, you can still save your data.

You’ll need a Linux distro with Live CD capability. I personally prefer Ubuntu , you may use any other whichever have a live cd capability like fedora, Linux mint, Debian any many more.

Tip: Get a Ubuntu cd/dvd. Insert it in your CD/DVD drive and boot from it. You will get following boot options:

1.Try without installing it.
2.Install
3.Memory test etc.

You have to choose “Try without installing it”.

Once it started you will get a desktop and you can see all your drives here. If no see in File and folder or Places or volumes or system menu. You will find it, I know. Look for your drive and copy your data in external hard drive or some other drive. (I am not including screen shots , as they changes version to version. Also finding your drive should not that difficult once you have a desktop with graphical interface).

Update: If your CD/DVD drive is not working please see following  post to proceed further:

Make boot-able Linux/Ubuntu USB drive using UNetbootin: Live CD solution to backup your data

3. Windows XP boots but give a blue screen or (laptop/systems with SATA features like DELL, HP etc)

4.Windows XP does not give login prompt or desktop.

Tip 1: Restart your system and enter into bios setup, Restore Default/Factory settings , save and exit.

Tip 2:If Tip does not work, try by enabling/disabling SATA mode , save and restart.

5. If your device is not being detected by your system please follow this post:

How-to-access-device-manager-in-windows : How-to-scan-for-hardware-changes-in-windows

6. If your system is slow, try this:

 Speed up Windows System

Well.. This is the basic of troubleshooting, I am going to add a lot in up-coming posts. Also   if you have a specific problem and I did not cover it in my this/up-coming post please leave a comment and I’ll try to answer. . 🙂