Problems Booting E1405 w/ XP

Question

I'm encountering a very puzzling problem with my wife's laptop, a Dell Inspiron E1405. We live about 40 miles from Santa Fe, NM and on Friday we drove to Santa Fe and my wife brought her laptop along with us so she could read me some stuff she had written. When we returned, she wanted to get online but the wireless was taking some time to, I believe, get synced up with the router and so she decided to reboot. The reboot process failed with a blue screen which indicated a problem with plug and play with the likely cause suggested as a driver problem. I have been unable for the last day and a half to get this laptop rebooted with Windows XP i.e. Windows XP Home. When we first got this laptop, about a year ago, I installed Fedora Linux on it. However, since it is my wife's laptop, she has not used the Linux installation. Anyway, I discovered that I am able to boot the laptop with the Linux installation just fine which suggests that the hardware being used by Linux is fine. I was also able to boot a Linux Live CD which allowed me to perform a backup of my wife's files. After getting her files backed up, I decided to see if I could run the diagnostics on the laptop and try to repair the XP installation with the original media. There are some pre-boot diagnostics that are available for running on a menu which one receives after pressing F12 during the boot process. I ran those and they all passed. I tried to boot from the Windows XP reinstallation CD but this failed with the same blue screen which claimed a plug and play error. I booted with the Dell Drivers and Diagnostic CD which came with the laptop and ran all the tests which are available including the ones in the troubleshooting option for not being able to boot. All of these passed. I booted with the Dell Media Direct reinstallation CD but that did not seem to offer me any options that I wanted to pursue at this time. So, that is where I am now. I'm really puzzled by all this and am not sure how to proceed. I'm very knowledgable of Linux but am not very knowledgable of Windows XP - although I have done a reinstallation of XP a couple of times in the past. I am wondering if the Dell Windows XP reinstallation CD has a repair capability although I'm not sure how I could use it if I can't boot it. I'm also a little puzzled about how this could be a driver or software problem if I can't boot from the original media installation CD. I have not updated the BIOS on this machine. If anyone could provide suggestions about what to do next or how to proceed, this would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Dave

dunedin · Answer

If it really is a driver problem you should be able to boot into Safe Mode

Press F8 repeatedly during boot up and you should get the Safe Mode Options screen.

Choose to boot into Safe Mode and go to

Start/right click "My Computer"/Properties/Hardware/Device Manager

Look at the devices here. An error should have a yellow splat at it.

If that does not help, again at the Safe Mode Options screen, select

"Last Known good Config"

Another option is to select
'Safe mode with command prompt'

At the command prompt type
C:\Windows\system32\restore\rstrui.exe

Hopefully this will open System Restore, so restore to a few days ago

snout_hound · Answer

Thanks. I don't seem to be able to boot into Safe Mode. I pressed F8 as you suggested and received an extensive menu of options. I selected the generic Safe Mode option. The laptop proceeded to boot but encountered the BSOD. Here is the stop code which was reported: STOP: 0x000000CA (0x00000001,0x8630F9E0,0x86369590,0x00000000) I have been reading various hits which I receive when I google 'STOP: 0x000000CA'. I am just speculating but I believe what probably happened is that my wife accidentally hit one of the Media Direct buttons when she was trying to restart her laptop. Back when I installed linux for dual booting, about 10-11 months ago, I wound up doing a reinstall of XP and the Media Direct stuff. We have never used the Media Direct stuff and so perhaps I never got it installed just the way that Dell had it installed. I can boot the Media Direct reinstall CD but it does not seem to offer me options that I want to pursue at this time - such as repartitioning or reformatting. Not sure if the additional info on the STOP code will be useful but perhaps it will. In summary, here is what I can currently do with this laptop: 1. Boot the Linux OS which is installed on the laptop. 2. Boot a KNOPPIX 5.1.1 Live CD which in principle would allow me to edit or examine things like boot.ini or the registry files. But I would not know what I am doing. 3. Boot the Dell Drivers and Utilities CD which came with the laptop. I can run diagnostics and have run several hours worth and have yet to get any test to fail. 4. Boot the Media Direct CD. 5. Switch into the BIOS and examine settings. 6. Perform pre-boot diagnostic checks available from the F12 menu. They all pass. 7. Get a long list of boot options when I press F8 during the boot process. Thanks for any help. Dave

dunedin · Answer

snout_hound wrote:
In summary, here is what I can currently do with this laptop: 1. Boot the Linux OS which is installed on the laptop. 2. Boot a KNOPPIX 5.1.1 Live CD which in principle would allow me to edit or examine things like boot.ini or the registry files.

OK then, boot up with one of the above and follow the instructions I gave you above for checking in Device Manager.

Also disconnect all peripherals or cards

snout_hound · Answer

@dunedin wrote:

@snout_hound wrote:
In summary, here is what I can currently do with this laptop: 1. Boot the Linux OS which is installed on the laptop. 2. Boot a KNOPPIX 5.1.1 Live CD which in principle would allow me to edit or examine things like boot.ini or the registry files.

OK then, boot up with one of the above and follow the instructions I gave you above for checking in Device Manager.

Also disconnect all peripherals or cards

I'm confused about how to follow the instructions which you gave previously with either of these two options. Your previous instructions seem to imply being able to run Windows commands or the Windows GUI. I'm not aware of how to do that when booted up with a Linux CD. Thanks for your comments and suggestions. Dave

Windows General

Was this post helpful?