[felix56]

I have a problem- My PC is a Compaq Presario. It's my 1st PC & i bought it about 4-5 years ago, as i needed a basic PC for a course i wanted to do.
Last week, following the USB cable becoming detached from my modem, my PC spontaneously rebooted, but would only start in 'Safe Mode'. After numerous attempts to reboot into normal mode, i bit the bullet & following the replacement of the modem USB cable, decided to attempt a 'Destructive Restart'. I'd done this twice before, so other than the inconvenience of having to reinstall most of my software, was not expecting any problems.
My OS is 'Windows XP Home' & it is embedded so there was no WXP disc supplied with my PC by the vendor. However, when i activated the 'System Restore' process, it told me that the files required were no longer available. Fortunately a friend had given me a copy of WXP Home some time ago, so i was able to reinstall WXP & activate it using my own activation code. This process seemed to be successful. It seems now though, that i have 2 copies of WXP installed on my [D:] drive, causing [D:] to send up a flag telling me my [D:] drive is now virtually full, as there is a maximum of only 3.42GB's on [D:] drive. [C:] drive has a maximum of 33.8GB's. Not only is there the problem of 2 copies of WXP on [D:] drive, but any further software installations are automatically placed on [D:] drive. Given that [D:] drive is so small, it's obvious that it will not take much [or anything else] in the way of new installations. My modem's software automatically loaded itself on [D:] without me being given the option of browsing to [C:] to install it anywhere else.
In addition, 'Add & Remove Programs' only shows the most recent installation of WXP & my modem's software. None of the programs on [C:] are listed, despite still being visible in [C:]'s Program Files.
The start menu shown at the beginning of start up, offers D://Windows XP or C://Windows XP as options to choose to boot from (just to complicate matters), however, choosing the [C:] option seems to be corrupted, as it only offers jagged lines running diagonally across the screen, then the boot process restarts in an endless loop. The [D:] option is the only one which will go right through to a successful boot.
Has anyone got any ideas? I am completely stumped & would appreciate anyone's constructive assistance.

[philthomas]

It's a pity you went ahead with a new install of XP, as you may have been able to carry out a repair with your friend's XP Disk.
As it stands now, you need to unscramble things.

Your best bet would be a new install of XP, but at the beginning of the installation, delete all the existing partitions, so you are left with just unallocated space. Obviously this will wipe the HDD, so anything you need to keep will need to be backed up first.

[felix56]

hey philthomas,
thanks for your suggestion. How do i delete the partitions? I don't recall seeing that as an option when i inserted the XP disc.
I reinstalled XP & i only seem to have 1 instance of XP in D: Except now my problem is that D: is the default partition & any software i install loads into D: Some software allows me to allocate it to C: but annoyingly my more vital software automatically loads into D: Any suggestions?

[felix56]

hey philthomas,
thanks for your suggestion. How do i delete the partitions? I don't recall seeing that as an option when i inserted the XP disc.
I reinstalled XP & i only seem to have 1 instance of XP in D: Except now my problem is that D: is the default partition & any software i install loads into D: Some software allows me to allocate it to C: but annoyingly my more vital software automatically loads into D: Any suggestions?,

[philthomas]

When you install XP, after the Licensing Agreement, you will encounter this screen :



In your situation, it will show all partititions, so you need to select each partition, one at a time and use the 'D' commmand as stated, to remove them all.
When you have got the drive back to Unpartitioned Space, you can then proceed with a fresh install.

HTH

[felix56]

i notice the heading at the top of the blue screen you showed that it is headed XP Professional. Will your solution work with XP Home

[philthomas]

Yep ..... should be exactly the same.