Problems at startup

[shortii]

Hi everyone. I'm having problems with my computer at startup. There's never any issues if I just do a restart or log off, only when I shut down. It doesn't happen every time, and is pretty unpredictable in this way.

The issue is when I turn the computer on it appears to be going through the motions of starting up but then it'll take me to a page with a number of options... to start in (a couple of different) safe mode options, last known good configuration or start normally. It won't start any other way than in safe mode and even then I have to try a number of times before safe mode will actually work. Once in safe mode I can do system restore and the computer will work fine for a few days or a week until it occurs again.

I've checked for virus's using my AV software and also a couple of online scans with nothing detected (except the items my AV has in quarantine) and I've restored to dates well before I was having any issues. I've also done extensive searches in help and support data base but only thing I can see is it may be a problem with my registry? If that's the case then I'm stumped and wouldn't have a clue where to start. I also thought that restoring would take my computer back to a place when there was no issue with registry and it should return to normal function?

I've done all the system checks, defrag, scandisk chkdsk etc as well, and gone into software repair wizard which only appears to give me the option to restore or recover.

Is there a diagnostic tool of any kind in windows XP that I can use which will identify problems within windows and fix them? Any other suggestions as to what the problem might be? I really really don't want to resort to doing a recovery and don't know where to go from here.

Thanks all.

 

[lhuser]

I think a repair install of Windows XP should fix it. You probably got a file that self-corrupts or somthing.

 

[shortii]

Am I able to do that without losing everything on my computer? I did a bit of a search in help and it sounded like I would lose all my files if I re-installed windows. Sorry if I sound clueless. Maybe I should pay someone to come do it for me if that's the only option.

 

[GlasseyeUK]

If you are doing a simple repair install then you will not lose all your files. The only way that will happen in reinstalling XP is if you choose the clean install and it will format the hard drive first.

Just put the cd in the drive, and restart, and it will boot, select repair XP, and you should be fine.

 

[ASSEMBLER]

use the windows repair console and this will just fix your boot problem rather than replacing all the windows files if you google it you will find out how to use the repair console as long as you have a windows xp disc.

 

[shortii]

Thanks guys for your help and advice. I thinking of getting a tech to have a look at it for me and do the repair. When I purchased my computer new from the store, all of the software and operating system came installed and I didn't get a copy of (only) windows xp on disk. What I do have is a set of recovery disks which will restore my computer to it's original condition and that's where my copy of windows is, along with all the other software originally installed. It says I can do a partial recovery which will recovery all factory installed software without affecting the files I've created since purchasing the PC, so I guess this sounds like my only option?

Thanks again for taking the time to respond and help me out.