Using DSL on WinXP (in Safe Mode)Forum: HD Install Topic: Using DSL on WinXP (in Safe Mode) started by: dcgames Posted by dcgames on Oct. 21 2006,05:55
I have a friend's computer I'm trying to fix for him. It's just a standard case with Windows XP Home, IBM Deskstar 20GB HD, Antec SL350 PSU, Lite-On burner drive (16x10x40), standard CD-ROM and floppy drives, ASROCK K7VM3 ATA133 mobo, and AMD Duron 1.6 Applebred 1.6GHz 64KB CPU. I finally figured out that the mobo and CPU were no good and my friend ordered another K7VM3 mobo with AMD CPU (the ones I mentioned above).The first thing to appear on the screen after I installed the new mobo and CPU was an error message on a black screen: "Invalid BOOT.INI file...Booting from C:/Windows." After that there was nothing. The light on my monitor went to orange (standby) and that was it. Obviously I need a fresh install of XP on the HD, but the problem is that my friend's wife has all her sewing files on there and she would like to save them. Since I can only reach the desktop in safe mode and can't burn anything while in safe mode one of the guys over at the SocketAPlus message forums suggested using damn small Linux to burn the files onto a CD-RW. I could stick my friend's HD in my own computer to get the files, but then I don't want to infect my system on the chance he might have viruses on that drive. Would I be able to install DSL on my friend's system and use it to burn his files to a CD (even in safe mode)? I appreciate the help. Thanks. Posted by ^thehatsrule^ on Oct. 22 2006,01:48
Some info:If you reinstall windows over the current one, only system files are affected - the rest of your data is still there If it's just the boot.ini that's bad, you can just copy a good one over ( usually c:\boot.ini ) You can run DSL natively... emulating it in windows won't help you much here. Boot with "dsl toram" to free your cd drive, and you can probably mount your hard drive from there for saving your files. |