Problem installing windows XP - wont go past 32 minutes remaining

[PlayingKarrde]

Hi all,

I'm having some major problems with installing Windows XP on my machine. I've been having problems with Windows XP not reading my iPod or being able to burn CDs/DVDs so I thought it was time for a reinstall. I've got too much important stuff on the hard drives right now so I went with a reinstall rather than a clean install.

It copied all the necessary files across and restarted to go into the normal windows install. After a while (while it initialised devices) it gave me a BSOD (IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL). I'd gotten this BSOD many times in the past but fixed it with drivers since it appeared to be a graphics card problem. However, after many more of these after restarting and trying again I decided to pull things out so I've gotten it down to its bare bones now, with just the cd drives, harddrives and graphics card installed and I'm not getting the BSODs now. However, it gets past the initializing devices stage, but stop at the part that says "Installing network". It says 32 minutes left and goes no further. It doesn't lock up since I can still move the mouse and there is still movement on the screen (the loading bar at the bottom right still moves) but it just stays there forever. I left it on overnight and it still said 32 minutes left.

This is seriously bad since I can't get into my old Windows now (or can I?) and i have some very tight deadlines coming up and can't afford a dead computer. I knew installing windows at this time was a risk but I took it anyway and not exactly reaping the benefits.

Can someone PLEASE help me. I'm serisouly stuck on this one. All help is greatly appreciated. If I can get back into windows without going through the installation that would be enough for me just so I can back up and/or work but this current situation is really killing me.

Thanks for your help.

Specs:
Athlon XP 2700+
ATI Radeon 9800
1024 DDR RAM
ASUS A7N8X Delux mobo

[sawedoff1]

do you have a winxp startup disk.....if you do put it in and restart or turn on your pc enter choose safe mode.....this will at least get you to your desktop

I would also say you should try cleaning your restore cd "winxp"

if you don't and you know someone else with xp goto my computer, right click on a: click format then at the bottom you will see create an ms-dos startup disk insert a 3.5 hard disk into a: click start and now you have one

if you don't have access to another system with xp a startup disk from win98 or winME may work the same

[PlayingKarrde]

Thanks for the reply.

I actually managed to fix it after wreaking my whole machine. I changed the boot order to CD so I could get the Windows installation back and simply started installing Windows again. Ended up deleting my old Windows folder but thats probably a good thing in the long run.