Help Please!:

I'm a Windows XP Home User (Wish I had stuck with Windows
2000).
At Welcome Screen I can see all the User log-in Icons for
my family and I.
No matter which one is selected (clicked on) log-on
proceeds but withing seconds log-off happens and 'personal
settings are saved'.
Booting-up in Safe Mode does not help.
Logging-on as Administrator does not help.
Trying Recovery CD Fix does not help.

Has anyone had any success in fixing this problem?

PLEASE DO NOT REPLY TO THIS REQUEST IF YOU DON'T REALLY
KNOW HOW TO FIX THE PROBLEM... THE LAST FELLOW 'MICHAEL
SOLOMON' DID NOT FULLY READ MY REQUEST AND GAVE ME A
BOTCHED REPLY.

If so please CC me on it- I would be most appreciative.

If not...let me know and I'll CC you if I'm successful in
obtaining a fix.

Thanks.

Joe - New York

jmcnyse(pleaseremovethis)@aol.com
..

"Joe" <anonymous@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:

Hi Joe.

Michael understood your problem perfectly, and the only thing that was
botched was your comprehension of the reply that he gave.

As your computer cannot be booted to any usable mode of operation with
Windows (normal, safe mode, last known good configuration are all
unusable according to your postings) you have two and only two options
available to you:

1. Reinstall Windows XP "over the top" of the existing install, using
what is called the Repair Install procedure in Windows XP. This will
preserve your installed applications, user data files and program
configuration settings. Windows updates will have to be reinstalled.
Instructions for doing this were included in Michael Solomon's reply
to you or you can find them on his web site at
http://michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

Note that in order to do a Repair Install you must have a genuine
Windows XP Installation CD. Many OEM versions of Windows XP come with
what is known as a "System Recovery Disk" and these are not capable of
doing a Repair Install.

2. Wiping out your entire system and reloading Windows XP on the
now-empty hard drive. Again Michael gave you instructions for doing
this in this response to you. And if your Windows XP is on a "System
Recovery Disk" then all you need to do is to boot with that disk and
follow the instructions. Everything on the hard drive will be wiped
out by this process and will be beyond recovery so you might want to
ensure that you have backups of your important data before proceeding
with this step.

I wish that a more encouraging response could be made in this instance
but the circumstances as you have described them are such that there
are no other viable options available.

p.s. there are several althernatives for recovering important files
from the hard drive, even if it is formatted NTFS. Post a response
back here if you need assistance with this.

Good luck


Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca

"The reason computer chips are so small is computers don't eat much."