Turn everything off. Now, disconnect all external devices except for keyboard, mouse and monitor. Next, connect the USB keyboard to a different USB port. Restart the computer. Press F8 about 2 times per second while the Dell logo is on the screen. Attempt to start the system in Safe Mode again. If successful, click on Start|All Programs|Accessories|System Tools|System Restore. Attempt to restore the system to a point before it started hangin up.
It would be helpful if we knew just what your son did to mess up the system. Did he delete files, manually force a shutdown by pressing the power button, or what?
Rest assured that the issue can be resolved without a loss of any data files. Patience is the key to getting the system back on track.
Thanks for your response. Following your advice I get to the part where I choose safe mode. When I press "enter" several (approx 20) lines of driver names come up on the screen. Theses lines remain for approximately 20 seconds and then a screen with "safe mode" written in each corner comes up. This remains for about 10 seconds and then the blue windows splash screen comes up and remains there without proceeding to the user accounts screen.
An example of one of the lines that appears is "multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS\system32\DRIVERS\isapnp.sys" These lines all read the same until the last back slash following the word "DRIVERS". What I assume is the driver name then follows which is different on each line.
It has been difficult for me to ascertain what my son has done. He is 13 and was attempting to repair an MSN problem (error code 800401F3) while communicating with some kind of help line. We got him to write down what he did as soon as we discovered the issue (about an hour later) but this is very vauge. He says he clicked Start, Run, and then he thinks he put "CMD". He then typed something as instructed by this help line??? He then attempted to resart the PC. This didn't work so he clicked "switch user" and achieved the result we now have.
tgsmith
2.9K Posts
0
January 25th, 2009 18:00
Martin,
Turn everything off. Now, disconnect all external devices except for keyboard, mouse and monitor. Next, connect the USB keyboard to a different USB port. Restart the computer. Press F8 about 2 times per second while the Dell logo is on the screen. Attempt to start the system in Safe Mode again. If successful, click on Start|All Programs|Accessories|System Tools|System Restore. Attempt to restore the system to a point before it started hangin up.
It would be helpful if we knew just what your son did to mess up the system. Did he delete files, manually force a shutdown by pressing the power button, or what?
Rest assured that the issue can be resolved without a loss of any data files. Patience is the key to getting the system back on track.
Tony
Martin yo
2 Posts
0
January 25th, 2009 20:00
Hi Tony,
Thanks for your response. Following your advice I get to the part where I choose safe mode. When I press "enter" several (approx 20) lines of driver names come up on the screen. Theses lines remain for approximately 20 seconds and then a screen with "safe mode" written in each corner comes up. This remains for about 10 seconds and then the blue windows splash screen comes up and remains there without proceeding to the user accounts screen.
An example of one of the lines that appears is "multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS\system32\DRIVERS\isapnp.sys" These lines all read the same until the last back slash following the word "DRIVERS". What I assume is the driver name then follows which is different on each line.
It has been difficult for me to ascertain what my son has done. He is 13 and was attempting to repair an MSN problem (error code 800401F3) while communicating with some kind of help line. We got him to write down what he did as soon as we discovered the issue (about an hour later) but this is very vauge. He says he clicked Start, Run, and then he thinks he put "CMD". He then typed something as instructed by this help line??? He then attempted to resart the PC. This didn't work so he clicked "switch user" and achieved the result we now have.
Any more ideas???
Martin