device file no longer exsist,windows registry

Did you remove any software prior to getting the messge? If no, start up the PC. Before the OS starts to load start tapping F8. A boot menu should come up. Choose 'Safe Mode Command Prompt Only'. At the c:\> prompt type scanreg/restore and enter. Choose a registry to restore with a date prior to the problem. If you did remove some software, what was it and does the error say that system.ini is missing or that a file being called by system.ini or the registry is missing?

yes i did remove a game i dont remember what the name was this is the exact message. cannot find a device file that may be needed to run windows or a windows application. the windows registry or SYSTEM.INI file refers to this device file but the device file no longer exists. if you deleted this file on purpose,try uninstalling the associated application using its uninstall or setup program if you still want to use the application associated with this device file try reinstalling that application to replace the missing file c;\PROGRA'1\SYMANTEC\SYMEVNT.386 Press a key to continue what is a application i to am new to this can u please help me im at witts end i am sending you this message from my lap top my desk top computer is not working properly thank you m.s

That's from a Norton/symantec program. It's often difficult to get a clean uninstall of their stuff. That's one reason I avoid all of their software. I googled SYMEVNT.386 system.ini and this was one of the returns: http://forums.techguy.org/windows-9... You might want to check some of the other hits too. Likely you'll have to run regedit to delete the registry references. If you're careful you shouldn't have any problems. If you do mess up you can restore a previous registry using scanreg/restore as I mentioned above. It's best to create a registry backup before you do anything, just in case. To do that just go to START---RUN and type in SCANREG

it said my computer should have windowsxp is there any way i could get a free down load

im in safe mode now message says bad command or file name

OK, you've got to provide w-a-a-a-y more information. What said you needed windows XP? What commnad were you attempting to run that resulted in the 'bad command or file name'?