Can't install xp from recovery cd

Hi,


I have already posted about this on another board but I thought I'd post on here as well to see if I can get some help.

anyway... I'll copy and paste...here goes it...
HI all,
I have XP home and a P4 3,gh and 250gb hd. I had Acronis True Image for over 2 years now and never had a problem restoring images.Never ever.Till a month ago.

What happened is that my pc started rebooting at random.I decided to restore the image using Acronis True Image.Half way thru the process of restoring TI image threw up an error up and the pc rebooted by itself again. I hit f11 to get the ATI pre-boot screen and my pc went beeeeeeeeeep and it wouldn't stop beeping till I hit power reset.I tried many times..Same result... beeeeeeep and all that.
I then inserted my original Xp cd and rebooted again. It would start the usual procedure of reinstalling Xp and then I would get some *.exe or *.dll error.Tried reinstalling xp from the cd over and over again but no joy.I am stuck with my old p4 with 128 of ram now Sad.

I called tech support, explained everything to the best of my ability.They made me do stuffat the pc and eventually told me that probably my hard drive is gone and that they will send a technician. After a week or so the techie came by with a new Hd.He removed the old one and put in the new one.No joy. Same errors.He went away and came back yesterday with a new motherboard.Removed the old motherboard and put in the new one.No joy.Same thing.

He suggested I remove True image .I took the the acronis bootable cd.I inserted and rebooted.I get the True Image splash screen then the pc restarts.


Now, when the pc restarts I have 3 choices: a)start from dvd b)hit f11 and start acronis c) none of the above

If I go with a) the pc initially reads the dvd then it either crashes, hangs or restarts.If I go with b) It starts beeping and it doesn't stop till I hit reset or pull the plug, c) it says it cannot find the OS


What can I do ?


Any help appreciated,

Banshee

 

1. I always zero my harddisk first, which removes everything on my harddisk.
2. Then I restart my computer with the Acronis Rescue CD in my CD/DVD-drive.
3. Then I restore my computer with an image, stored on my external harddisk.
OR
1. I zero my harddisk first.
2. Use my original "Windows CD" and install Windows manually.

If that doesn't work you have a hardware problem.

 

I am thinking ErikAlbert is correct with his hardware statement. The beeps are your BIOS trying to tell you something. The 2 main culprits have already been replaced. The Tech should have known or been able to find out with a simple phone call to his support just what the BIOS were trying to tell you. It could still be as simple as a loose cable or since the mobo has been replaced without success it could be memory or a processor problem. I do not know where you bought the PC at but most major retailers have a Lemon Law. "If the PC is not fixed in 3 attempts you have the right to a new one of at least equal or greater value".
One other possibility, your attempted PC repair may have been done with "refurbished" parts. Meaning used\reconditioned\re-tested parts. Always possible they were bad as well.
Used to do this for a living, I have seen it happen plenty of times.

 

if the pc has two ram sticks would you mind taking one of them out and then trying to see if the pc works?
if not try the same with the other stick.
its worth a shot and you have got nothing to lose trying it.
if you have only got one ram stick then see if you can borrow a ram stick that works from a friend.
since the motherboard has been changed and so has the hard drive the only other componants that remain are the graphics card and the ram.
it could be eiether.
lodore

 

That's right. I don't think it was a very knowledgeable Tech, otherwise the problem would have been fixed after the first visit. He just replaced hardware components without any further reasoning.

 

This story sounds very much like a hardware problem, motherboard, CPU, memory.
That kind of problem...

 

Banshee,
Ask for a knowledgeable tech with many years of experience and your computer will be fixed in no time OR ask for a new computer.

 

Folks,

Thank you very much for your input.I do appreciate it.

I will try the "ram" trick.The tech will come by either Monday or Tuesday and pick my pc up.I will prob get it back in 2 weeks or so.It's a pain-This thing has been going on for over a month now.

 

hmmmm....never heard of that being done. Are they leaving you a loaner?

 

In slight defense of the Tech. (used to be one ) If his company is run anything like the ones I used to work for then he had little choice in the matter. All the pre-visit trouble shooting is done prior to him even being aware of the symptoms\problem. The EU (=End User) calls the warranty company, a Help Desk Tech. walks them through a series of basic trouble shooting procedures. A diagnosis is then made. The Road Tech. then receives a Work Order with a brief description of the problem and in most cases a single part. In this case first the HDD then the mobo. Unfortunately it really is not possible for the Tech. to ride around with every possible part to fix every possible problem on a first visit. I carried more spare parts then most. Besides enough tools to do up to and including a mobo swap, I also carried enough diagnostic CDs and mobo tatooing CDs to choke a horse. Spare RAM, a generic AGP & PCI graphics card, dial-up modem and ethernet card with native Windows support, as well as floppies with just the drivers on them just in case. Cables and adapters of every possible description, also usually drug my lap top along. I could use to test the EU`s monitor in the event of display issues. It came in handy as well for network issues and access to the internet if the EU`s was hosed for what ever reason.
IMO, the system we worked under sucked. However we were at the bottom of the food chain and had no options.
Side note; I was paid for one hour (regardless of how long it took) on site + mileage. Many a time I would have 3 hrs. tied up on site trouble shooting and making nice with an unhappy Customer. We were not allowed to deal with software issues at all other then what had to do with the hardware we replaced. It is amazing the crap I found on peoples PCs. The obvious infections of all sorts, expired AV`s, etc.

 

The beep is a BIOS code.
It sounds like one long beep,
if you give us the details of your computer, we can look this up
and let you know what it means. (It sounds like a bad memory stick to me)

 

-----

 

Wishful thinking.

 

it could be the power supply that caused the reboots.

one of my computers kept on rebooting once. i took it to pieces and couldn't work out what the problem was until i bought a new one and that started rebooting too. that's when i worked it out lol, it was the extension cable

https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=139867 lol