installing windows xp home edition something has gone wrong afterwards

[doorxc0re]

okay well,

i have just installed windows xp home edition on my computer,

but when i restart or turn on my computer it goes onto a blank screen with white underscore on the page.

i have to have my installation disk for home edition in the drive for it to start.

how can i just get it so i can just turn on my computer and it will just automatically let me use my computer without having to use the disk????

please help,

it would be very appreciated.

many thanks.

Ben.w

[nellie2]

Did you install this operating system on a clean formatted hard drive or did you upgrade... in other words did you install it over the top of an earlier operating system.

If you installed it over the top of another operating system then I suggest you backup your important documents and date (don't forget your favourites, email addresses and drivers.) Then format your hard drive and do a fresh install.

[doorxc0re]

Did you install this operating system on a clean formatted hard drive or did you upgrade... in other words did you install it over the top of an earlier operating system.

If you installed it over the top of another operating system then I suggest you backup your important documents and date (don't forget your favourites, email addresses and drivers.) Then format your hard drive and do a fresh install.

well it all started when i decided to upgrade my computer to windows xp proffessional,

so my mate gave me a copied xp disk, i installed it all, but i was not happy with it because windows recognised it as an illegal copy so i could nopt update ect ect.

so i already had a windows xp home edition upgrade package, but it would not let me upgrade.

so i have now got an xp home edition full package.

so i installed that onto my computer and now it will not start without the disk being in there?

how can i do what you replied to me??

thank you very much.

Ben.w

[cozofdeath]

When you get into windows. Look in your device manager and is there with a yellow error icon next to it? Next I would try looking in the msconfig.exe utility and in the boot.ini tab click the "Check all boot paths" button, and or post it in here to make sure your boot paths are correct. You could also go into the recovery console and rebuild your boot.ini file with this command "bootcfg /rebuild". The fixboot and fixmbr commands could also help. Hope something there helps you :D

[nellie2]

I don't think you can roll back from XP Pro to XP Home. And if the XP Pro that is causing the problems is illegal then this members best bet is to format his hard drive and start again.

Back up all your important documents and programs... save them to dvd or cd or to a seperate hard drive, and then you can format your C drive and reinstall your legitimate copy of windows

There is an excellent guide here

http://www.simplyguides.net/guides/xp_home...all_part1.shtml

Because you have an upgrade disk you will need to have an old copy of W98 or WME or W2k handy, all you will have to do is put it in your drive at an early point in the installation process to show Windows that you have an earlier operating system

[djohn]

nellie2 is correct, XP will not let you downgrade. You will need to do as she says and install fresh after formatting the drive. Normally XP will let you insert the disk and give you the option to install, but in this instance you will need to go into BIOS and set your CD drive as first boot device, save and exit. Insert the XP disk in drive, turn off PC and reboot, follow instructions from there. :)