Windows 98 startup problems

[tidalik]

A friend running Win 98 on her computer is experiencing startup issues.

Recently she was surfing the net when her system hung, she automatically turned the pc off (grrr) and now when she attempts to start the pc, before windows starts is prompted by a Windows advanced boot option menu. On selecting resume normal startup, her system hangs during the Windows startup process.

Could she have a virus?

Should i try and start in Safe Mode and troubleshoot from there?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[Gecko]

Yes I would start with booting into safe mode to see if it will boot at all.
It could be a virus but this type of error is more often hardware failure or a driver issue.
If it boots into safe mode OK then run a scandisk and try rebooting to normal.