I'd very much appreciate any help anyone can give with this problem.

PROBLEM:
Windows XP appears to boot as normal until the welcome screen should appear. Instead, the screen flickers on an off quickly and then displays a blank screen, with a normal windows cursor in the centre. The system will do nothing from this point, no keystoke or combination has any effect. Exactly the same thing happens when I try to boot in Safe Mode from the F8 menu before windows loads, except that "Safe Mode" appears in each corner of the screen.

BACKGROUND:

My System:
Windows XP Home
Intel Celeron 2Ghz processor
Asus P4S800-MX-EAYZ motherboard
Unknow makeGeForce FX 5200 (128 MB DDR, 64 bit) graphics card
D-Link DWL-G520+ Wireless LAN card
Creative Audigy 2 Player sound card

Lead Up to Problems:
1. I was having problems with rundll32.exe being lost somehow. (Error message when trying to open control panel dialogs). I tried to sort this by restoring the file from the XP cd accoriding to MS article 812340, http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;812340. However, this was only a temporary fix the error occured a couple more times
2. I suspected a virus so I installed Grisoft AVG Free Edition. This found 3 viruses, 1 of which it removed by itself, the others were only in files, not the registry, so I deleted them and emptied the recycle bin. My computer appeared to be working fine for a couple of days until...
3. 2 fatal crashes in a row: Machine appears to boot normally, then just as the last programs load, it reboots itself. It did this twice in a row, the second time the crash occured just after I told it to send an error report, but before it finished it.
4. After this, It loaded normally, and again produced the "Windows has recovered from a serious error" dialog box. I sent the error report and it said that a device driver was at fault.
5. I downloaded the latest grapics card and wireless LAN drivers (from nvidia.com and d-link.com), then found I couldn't install them due to the problem with rundll32.exe
6. Did a thourogh virus check in safe mode, found nothing, so I replaced rundll32.exe as before, then installed the new dirvers.
7. The machine rebooted correctly once, (when asked by the nvidia driver program), and it did so correctly. I did nothing special with the computer that night.
8. The following morning, the first time I started the computer the symptons described at the top started happening.

Thanks very much for any help.

Sandy Scott

Did you try Last Good Configuration? (In the area where you tell it to start up in Safe Mode).

This file rundll32.exe. Where exactly did you find it? Was it in c:\windows or in c:\windows\system32? If it was found in c:\windows, it's a virus. Also when you have a virus you have to turn off your system restore to delete the files cause the viruses put a back up in there that will reinstall itself. Let me know where it was.

I did try last known good configuration, but it didn't change anything. Also I think that the rundll32.exe was in c:\windows\system32 as I simply copied and pasted the command to restore the file from the article I mentioned.

I have another installation of windows on that computer, that hasn't been run since I put it on. Is there anything useful that could be done from it? I'd rather use it only as a last resort though, to make sure my documents are safe as it involves removing some hardware that was installed after that installation.

Sandy if you can, back up all your documents now before you lose them. You can try a repair install. That will install the XP on top of the old installation, without data loss. Here is how that is done. You will want to use method 2. When it says you won't lose data that's correct, but there is always that chance. I'm assuming you have a full installation XP CD and not a recovery disk from like Dell or HP etc.? If you have the XP disk then try the repair install ( also called an in-place upgrade). Before you do that though run the system file checker. It will scan the system files and repair or replace any that are damaged or corrupted. Go to start/run and type in

sfc /scannow

then hit OK. It will ask for you to insert your CD. The program will run automatically. You don't have to do anything. Here's the link for the repair install

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;315341...duct=winxp

Thanks, the system file checker didn't find anything, but the repair install worked, and I havn't had to reinstall anything. Much Appreciated.

Hi,
I experience the same problem as well. The sympthoms are the same. However, there is nothing I can think of that might have resulted the problem. When it gets to the Welcome Screen, the screen becomes blank with a tiny cursor in the middle.

I tried to access Windows XP in Safemode. However, it does not seem to be working.

So, I tried to reinstall my Windows XP and the same problem actually occured again.

Does anyone know the solution to this problem?

My computer specs:

Windows XP Professional
Pentium 4 1.6 MHZ
Gigabyte Motherboard GA-81DX
Intel Chipset 845
512 MB PC-133 SDRAM

I have been using the computer for the past 2 1/2 years and before this, there is no problem at all.

I have tried updating the BIOS and Chipset, but it does not work.

My best solution to this problem right now is to switch the computer off completely (plug out the cord from power outlet). After you plug it back in again, it gets into the Window. But I do not know on how much longer I can stick with this method. Any suggestions?

Did you do a repair install or a whole new full install? Do the thing that gets you into Windows. Open My Computer. Right click on your C Drive or which ever has the operating system on it. Go to the tools tab. Press the Check Now button in Error Checking. Put an X in both the Check Disk Options. Hit Start. It will give you a message saying it can't do it, would you like to run it on the next boot blah blah. Hit OK and reboot and let it scan your drive for bad sectors and to replace any bad sectors. Post back and let me know.

SOLUTION:

Take a look at jjscarlett's post at:

http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic136207.html

This enables you to do a system restore on XP from the recovery console!

(Do a second system restore from Windows itself after doing this)


Alternatively, you can use Microsoft's Diagnostics & Recovery Toolset to perform a System Restore. See here:

http://www.winhelponline.com/blog/perform-system-restore-rollb...-computer/



If this works for you, you may have to re-install your display drivers. If you cannot change your screen resolution or screen saver setting from display properties (like I couldn't), try this fix:

from Start, Run dialog, type:

regsvr32 themeui (hit enter and wait for message)
regsvr32 /i shell32 (hit enter and wait for message)

Restart Windows.

Joe B