XP RECOVERY CONSOLE IS NOT ASKING FOR PASSWORD AFTER INSTALLING 1 FOR QUESTION FOR WHICH INSTALLATION DO I WANT. IT JUST GIVES ME THE NEXT PROMPT SHOWING: C:\WINDOWS? I GAVE IT MY PASSWORD ANYWAY AND IT GIVES ME THE SAME PROMPT AGAIN. PLEASE HELP.1 person needs an answerI do too

You're already in the Recovery Console which is a command line application. What are you trying to accomplish in the Recovery Console? Using the Recovery Console - http://www.wown.com/j_helmig/wxprcons.htm How to Use the Recovery Console - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307654/ MS-MVP - Elephant Boy Computers - Don't Panic!

Thanks for replying. I'll re-explain and will add in my explanation some elses advice if you don't mind. I had a password to boot the PC then another password for the admin password to log in. I had the boot up password removed in the Bios but still would not boot up. I would press F8 function key to get to the screen that had different options: Safe mode, Last Known Good Config, Boot Windows Normally, etc. but none of those options worked at all. Once the machine went to a blue screen that said: A problem has been detected and Windows has been shut down to prevent damage to your computer. Once the machine went to a blue screen, (it has only done this once) and asked me if this was the 1st time that this screen has come up if so reboot, and if this screen comes up again that there may be a Virus or Hard Drive corruption and to run CHKDSK /F. I was advise to:Don't select the first R option that leads you to the Recovery Console. Instead, do the following.... When you see the message displayed on the Welcome to Setup screen, press enter, to Setup Windows XP now, press enter. At this point an option to press R to enter the recovery console is displayed. Do not select this option. Proceed like you would to install Windows fresh. On the windows xp licensing agreement screen, press f8 to agree to the license agreement. Make sure that your current installation of Windows XP is selected in the box, and then press the R key to repair Windows XP. Follow the instructions on the screen to complete setup. Now I can get this far but my questions for you are, {Does the used Partition [NTFS] space in Windows XP Setup Screen indicate the currently installed XP operating system? I'm trying to save my files while I'm trying to repair Windows XP? Also if I press "R", is this command to repair it or does it have to tell me to hit "R" first before pressing it?}

Go no further until you pull the data. You can do this even if you can't get into Windows. See the methods below. Once the data is safe, do some hardware troubleshooting because there is no point in doing software solutions with Windows if the hardware is bad. http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/page2.html#Hardware_Tshoot If the hardware is bad, decide whether you want to replace it based on the age of the computer balanced with the cost of replacing the component(s). If the hardware is good, try a Repair Install first. If the Repair Install doesn't work, do a full Clean Install. http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm - Repair Install How-To http://michaelstevenstech.com/cleanxpinstall.html - Clean Install How-To http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/page2.html#Reinstalling_Windows - What you will need on-hand To retrieve data when you can't get into Windows - assuming that the hard drive is physically viable: 1. Pull the drive and put it in a USB drive enclosure or use a USB drive adapter. Attach this to a computer running a working install of XP/Vista/Windows7. Use the working Windows Explorer to copy the data to the rescue system's hard drive and then burn the data to cd or dvd or copy it to an external hard drive. I prefer not to do this if I know the drive is infected because there is a chance of infecting the host system. In these cases, I use #2 below. 2. You can boot the target computer with a Bart's PE (XP only) or a Linux Live CD such as Knoppix or Ubuntu and retrieve the data that way. This has the additional advantage of telling you whether the problems you're having are hardware or software-related because if the computer behaves perfectly under Linux you know that Windows (software) is the culprit. Conversely, if the computer misbehaves under Linux you will know that there is a hardware problem. Here is general information on using Knoppix for data retrieval when you can't get into Windows: You will need a computer with two cd drives, one of which is a CD/DVD burner OR a USB thumb drive with enough capacity to hold your data OR an external USB hard drive. Download the Knoppix .iso and create your bootable CD*. If you are doing this in an older operating system (XP or Vista), you'll need third-party burning software like Nero, Roxio, or the free ImgBurn (Windows 7 can burn .isos natively). Burn as an image, not as data. Then boot with the CD you created and Knoppix will be able to see the Windows files. If you are using the USB thumb drive or the external hard drive, right-click on its icon (on the Desktop) to get its properties and uncheck the box that says "Read Only". Then click on it to open it. Note that the default mouse action in the window manager used by Knoppix (KDE) is a single click to open instead of the traditional MS Windows' double-click. If you want to burn CD/DVDs, use the K3b program. *If your computer only has one optical drive and you want to use that drive to burn data or need to test the drive, you can create a bootable USB thumb drive running Linux instead of a bootable CD. This website will show you how to do that - http://www.pendrivelinux.com http://www.knoppix.net http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/ - Bart's PE Builder Also see - http://lifehacker.com/5504531/the-complete-guide-to-saving-your-windows-system-with-a-thumb-drive And for future disaster recovery strategies - http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/page2.html#Backing_UpMS-MVP - Elephant Boy Computers - Don't Panic!