Thanks for the reply, no but I will. Assuming I can get to safe mode with command prompt what then? I really do not know command prompts.

 

Also, what if I cannot get to safe mode with command prompt?

OK, I tried booting into safe mode with command prompt and it went to a screen showing all the files it was loading in a smallish window as it normally would before booting into safe mode, seemed to stop for approx. 20 seconds and then tried to reboot into regular windows. It failed of course after showing the splash screen for the computer and then entered another reboot cycle and keeps doing this.

Have you tried safe mode with command prompt?

Kapalua, if nothing else works you will have to do the following to get it to boot.

 

How to recover from a corrupted registry that prevents Windows XP from starting

Connect your non-bootable hard drive to the other computer.
 
Open Windows Explorer.  Click on Tools|Folder Options|View.  Check the box beside "Show hidden files and folders".  Apply your change.
 
Navigate to the d:\System Volume Information folder ( d: represents the crashed drive letter).
You will see a folder named something like _restore{.........}  the dots represent an alpha-numeric sequence.

In this folder you will see folders named RP0....RPnn.  Find the one with the highest number.
These are your System Restore points.  In the highest numbered folder you will see a folder named snapshot.  In this folder are registry hive files which you need to recover your system:

_registry_user_.default
_registry_machine_security
_registry_machine_software
_registry_machine_system
_registry_machine_sam

Create a subdirectory; i.e, d:\Windows\TMP. Copy these files to the TMP subdirectory.  Rename them:

default
security
software
system
sam

Note:  Be sure to lose the period (.) in the file named _registry_user_.default
Delete the files in the d:\windows\system32\config subdirectory with the same names.
Copy the d:\windows\tmp files to the d:\windows\system32\config. subdirectory.
Put your drive back in its original system.  Your system should start normally.  If you get the same error go back and choose another folder ( RPnn-1) and repeat the procedure.

I am not able to boot to that either.

You may have to perform a "Repair Installation" of XP. Have a look at this article for step by step instructions.

Maybe "last known good config"

 

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307852

 

Tom

Your only other option is to try a Repair of XP as mentioned by another member, but if that fails then you have no other choice than to do as I suggested in my last post. Or reinstall XP clean.

 

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm#RI  repair XP

Thanks but the hard drive is in a laptop from which I'm unlikely to be able to remove it, let alone connect it to another machine. Is there another way?