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[freelobotomy]

[icecube]

It seems to be a hardware issue.

See if you can boot into safe mode.

I would recomend trying to do a rollback to an earliery date (System Restore).

Turn the system off and put the old video card back in and then reboot.

Here is a link to the more technical aspects of what and why

[freelobotomy]

It won't boot into Safe Mode, I get the same error message. I tried System Restore as noted in my original post as well as re-installing the original video card before I tried System Restore. I just tried to re-install XP Pro but it hangs at the setup string.. any other suggestionswould be greatly appreciated.

[icecube]

Does your cd of xp have service pack 2 already installed (slipstreamed) on it? Or did you have to install service pack two seperatly after you installed the OS.

If the cd has service pack 2 installed on it, put in the new video card. Insert the cd and boot from it and do a new install F8,[ I Agree]no formating to the same windows directory. It will search the hard drive and find the previous install. At that point you will be offered a repair option. Choose that and about 30 minutes later it should boot and ask you for your product key. Your anti virus might give you an error or two --nothing to worry about hopefully.

[Gecko]

You could try expanding the Kernal32.dll file from your windows XP CD

Insert your Windows XP installation disk into your CD drive.
When the "Welcome to Setup" screen appears, press R to start the Recovery Console.
Now type 1 and press enter to select your OS ( if you just perss enter it will reboot)
When you are prompted, type the Administrator password, if the administrator password is blank, just press ENTER.

At the command prompt, type
expand d:\i386\ Kernal32.dl_ c:\windows\system32\
and then press ENTER.

The above assumes that your CD drive is d, if your CD drive is different change the letter d to the right letter.
(expand your-cd-drive:\i386\ Kernal32.dl_ c:\windows\system32\ )

[icecube]

Geckos solution might be the quickest route to go. The issue I worry about here is: Does Service Pack 2 rewrite the kernal32.dll?

The easiest way around that question is to spend $30 and buy another drive and install the os again and then hook up the problem child up as a slave and harvest the data you need.

[freelobotomy]

Let me tell you folks about the godsend to all who call ourselves techies or reasonable facsimiles. I bought an HDD enclosure from CompUSA for $50 & saved all the data I needed to. You can buy smaller ones for less (100GB for about $35) but I was looking to the future. Mine supports up to 400GB HDD's and when I painlessly installed it, my otherwise un-bootable HDD was a hot swappable USB drive and I simply dragged the data needed to MY system & backed up to DVD. I even formatted the drive from this machine. Fast, no drivers needed for XP and reliable. I can't wait to pore over my old HDD's stored in the basement with this thing. I'd be happy to post a link, if anyone is interested. I swear, one day you WILL need this. Thanks for all your help. I always know where to turn 1st, pctechforums.com

BTW, I couldn't ever get to a boot screen, format screen, nothing...I was hosed and tried everything suggested here. Icecube's suggestion got me to thinking....hmmmm...& the enclosure which really just converts the problem to a USB drive worked like a dream, just as it will when then next HDD fails...as they all eventually do!

[icecube]

Why didn't I think of that??

Thats a real simple solution--neat and quick. Thanks for the tip