Computer wont start up.

Question

I have this dell demension l500c and it wont start up.

When I turn it on it goes to the dell splash screen, and freezes for a little bit, then gives me an error saying windows did not load, and wants me to choose like safe mode, or last known good configuration, etc. But when I choose one of those, doesnt mater which one, it goes to the windoes splash screen where its loading, loads for like 5 seconds, and then restarts the computer.

What could be causing this?

Zidion · Answer

hmm, why was this moved to the inspiron section? This is a deminsion...

shesagordie · Answer

Zidion.   When you post, don't use l500c, post it as  'Dimension L Series 500c'  Repost back in the Dimension board.   Bev.

scottatah · Answer

not sure about the message appearing all over, but there's a couple possibilities.   1) harddrive is pooched 2) windows is pooched (may or may not see a blue screen flash momentarily before the reboot)     Best option with whatever kinda computer you're running is to try running the harddrive diagnositcs either the 90/90 diags.  Or go into the custom 32bit diags and run a confidence test.  If thats not an option for whatever reason, then thats unfortunate.   Assuming your running windows xp?  i'd go ahead and try a repair install.  If you don't get the option of a repair install, thats another bad sign.  See whether windows even recognizes your installation partition as an NTFS partition or just unknown.  If unknown - it's starting to look like the harddrive is pooched.  You can try doing a parallel install for hte purpose of being able to recover some data, but it'll likely tell you it needs to format.   At that point, Id wanna run the diags to verify the harddrive is pooched.  Or you can cont on with a format and install of windows (if it'll let you format).

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Computer wont start up.

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