Win XP setup - copies file but doesn't boot

[kutezz]

Hi guys,

I'm really clueless here . Please help if you can.

Background: Two days ago, I tried to merge two of my partitions with Magic Partition. The system rebooted, Magic Partition almost completed the merging process when an error occurred. I don't remember what error it was. After that, the system wouldn't start. So I decided to perform a clean installation. (i had saved my important data on the largest of my partitions prior to partition merge )

Problem as is: I inserted my licensed Win XP copy and when I got to the blue screen, I deleted and formated all partitions (2) except for the one storing my data. After creating a FAT32 partition, I proceeded to installing XP. Common process... The files are copied, the system reboots. The Windos XP logo screen appears (no progress bar) and and my PC gets stuck there. I don't get to see the smooth looking-user-friendly blue windows XP screen where the installation process is shown with cool progress bars and the mouse is active.

Specs
XP Pro SP2
Intel Pentium 4 2400
512 DDRAM


Thanks for any hints!

[Wolfeymole]

Redo what you did in your second paragraph kutezz but this time format it as NTFS rather than FAT32.
Get back if any problems then.

[liambl]

FOrmtaing in FAT32 shouldnt've caused this, I have a laptop that came formatted in FAT32. Have you tried another format/install?

[Panama Red]

I would pull the hdd, attach it to another pc as a slave and see if all the "saved" files are still intact. You may find PM merging caused a corruption. Transfer all the saved files to a different drive, use the XP cd to do another fresh install but this time delete all partitions. If XP keeps wanting to try to complete the first install, use PM to delete both partitons and reformat to NTFS (or FAT32 if you prefer). Then retry the XP install.