Hello. Okay, I have a little problem right now and I can't figure out what to do. I have Windows ME, and well, lets just say I'm less than satisfied with it. I tried installing Windows XP, made a stupid mistake, and messed everything up. Basically, what I believed happened was it was in the process of removing WinME (or had already removed it) and was about to install WinXP, but had nothing to read off of since the WinXP CD was not in the drive. Instead of continuing installation, the computer boots up with the Compaq screen, as usual, then just sits at a black screen with the blinking cursor forever. Right now I'm going to forget about XP and just worry about reformatting and getting ME back before I try anything else again. I have the Quick Restore CDs that came with the system, but they don't work. Two of them don't load, and the third loads and says to contact Compaq Technical Support. Once, I was able to reformat, and thought I did so. But when it was done it just loaded a Windows text box that had me rather puzzled. I don't remember exactly what it said, but it was something along the lines of "Drive is not partitioned" and then gave me the choices of "yes", "no", and "no to all". Seeing as how that's not exactly a question, I had no idea what to press, and I think I ended up clicking no. I do have a Windows ME boot disk that I'm not exactly sure what to do with. I can run it okay, and I ran a few things that didn't work. I did a "scandisk /all" which found nothing wrong with any of my drives. I also tried a "scanreg /all" which I'm not exactly familiar with, but that brought up one file that I restored.. Not sure what it did, but it still doesn't boot up or anything. I don't think I have the original Windows ME CDs. The only thing I can do is get into DOS mode. I'm not too familiar with that either, but I can run anything off the ME boot disk, so I'm hoping there's something on there that can help me. So I turn to you guys. Please ask questions if I wasn't clear.. I have decent computer knowledge but when it comes to this stuff I'm pretty lost, so I'm not sure if I explained everything correctly. Thanks, Kyle

The bootdisk you mention did you have that on hand or did you go to Bootdisk.com and download and create one from them? I didn’t see where in your post you mentioned if you have run fdisk yet to initialize the harddrive, that maybe what you are up against right now, breath a sigh of relief in that you came to the right place for help, if you could please post back the machine details and what all you have done up to this point and incase your not aware a lot of store bought machines came with a restore cd however that only helps to get to a semi hidden partition on the hard drive where the real location of the OS install files were placed at the factory. The recover CD was where all the added goodies were stored for a reinstall. Maybe rethink getting XP on there as someone will probably come along and say thats what they would do however if you do want to get ME back on there we all can walk you through it. Keep the old stuff running

Thanks for the quick reply :). First off, yes, I did download the bootdisk from bootdisk.com. I have run fdisk but I haven't done anything major. It sounds like something that'll help, but I'm not sure what to do. First off, when I start it it gives me a long explanation of large disks. It tells me I have a disk larger than 512 MB, and if I enable large disk support it will only work with that OS, or something like that. I just chose no because I thought I could screw something up if I clicked yes. If I should have clicked yes please tell me, but keep in mind after this I'll be switching to WinXP and from how it sounds, I won't be able to use the drive with WinXP (but I'm probably wrong, if someone could clarify that'd be great). I get 5 options when I run fdisk.. which one should I use? 1. Create DOS partition or Logical DOS Drive 2. Set Active Partition 3. Delete partition or Logical DOS Drive 4. Display partition information 5. Change current fixed drive As I browse some of these options, it comes to my attention that only one of my drives is partitioned, which is C:. C: is the drive that came with the PC, but I also have a D:, which is a 200 GB hard drive I got a couple months ago. I know I've never done this before so I'm not sure if I've partitioned it or if I need to or whatever. Regarding PC information, I'm not sure what you need but it's a Compaq Presario 7000 (couple years old), and an AMD Athlon processor.. I'd have to check on everything else. I think I'd rather make the switch back to Windows ME before I re-install Windows XP, but if someone knows of an easier way to do XP I'll just make the switch to that.. I just thought it'd be a little easier to go back to ME because at least I know that works (by WinME standards, that is :p). Thanks.

Proceed with caution from here out if you still have the mindset to fall back to ME for your system you will answer fdisk with #1 and then before exiting select #2 to make that partition active (you need that for it to boot from current harddrive) one note of caution you might want to remove the second harddrive you mention so anything on that will not be lost, you can easily hook it back up after the system is back up and stable. I have a link hear that will allow you to see what is needed to get ME back on your system and it maybe easier for you to find answers for yourself during the reinstall, take a peek at this site: http://www.windowsreinstall.com/indexwinme.htm I did a quick check on what your system came with out of the box and looks as though XP would fit on that box quite well, unless you have a real need for ME leave it behind and get something newer running on that platform you've got. You were not to clear if what you were trying was an upgrade to XP or a fresh install if the ladder set your bios to boot from cd and go with XP. Post back what you come with so as to be able to help us help you, or the next person with a problem like yours. :) Keep the old stuff running

Thanks for the link, I'm looking into it right now and I'll let you know if I have any questions. I was doing a fresh install to XP, and I've already set the BIOS to what it needs to be, but the CD won't work.. It just sits at that black screen with the cursor after the Compaq logo. I'm not sure if I'm supposed to anything different, because as far as I know I can't run the install from DOS, and I have no OS so I can't get that screen to come up.. It's puzzling, which is why I chose to do it this way in the first place. Alright, so I'm going to check out that link and try their solution and post my results.

Okay, I tried it out and I'm a bit stumped. I was able to navigate that link to the ways to reinstall WinME, and I chose the method that just said format and reinstall. I went into DOS and did a "format c:\", which successfully formatted that drive. Unfortunately, I'm not sure what to do next. The QuickRestore CDs still tell me to contact Compaq Support, and I no longer have the original CDs. I do have the boot disk though. Anyone know what I'm supposed to do next?

What it sounds like is that your disks do not have the orginal files on them , see if on one of them there is a folder called i386 inside of it are thr cab files you would need, if you find it you should at this point be able to run setup and be back up and running if not maybe give up on ME and just go with XP.... Keep the old stuff running