I was a dummy, and I tried to experiment with my boot.ini file by adding the "/3gb" flag to it, and now my box won't boot -- it gets to the loading screen with the windows logo and the scrolling progress var, then goes black. Even though it makes noise like it's thinking, it remains black from then on. I have discovered that, of course, I cannot find my recovery CD. I know the issue is that little flag in my boot.ini file, so what I need is instructions on how to make a boot cd that will allow me to start up, and change the C:\boot.ini file. If I need to use the command prompt, that's ok, but I'll need to know how to go about doing it. Thanks!

bootdisk.com Hope this helps Below is a boot ini for xp pro [boot loader] timeout=30 default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS [operating systems] multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

Try pressing F8 when it is booting and see if it will give you the Safe Mode menu. If not you can use your XP install CD to boot up on. There is a repair mode which allows you a c: prompt even for a NTFS file system. I know you can copy and rename files from there but I am not sure if you can edit files.

A DOS boot floppy will probably not do the job. DOS cannot access a NTFS drive, which most XP users have. You might find some help at this web site: http://www.ntfs.com/products.htm

You can download NTFS4DOS to access the drive in NTFS or Bart's PE to create a boot CD with it to edit the file. If you use Bart's PE, you'll need your XP disc to make the CD. You can also slave the drive to another PC and copy the file that way. Dress modestly, it shows people that you care about yourself.

If you can get to safe-mode... then you can access the boot.ini (via wordapd/notepad - whichever) and remove the addition you made to it...; save the change and reboot? The sample boot.ini in post-1 above will give you some idea of how it's meant to look. Also you can use Recovery Console to restore a working boot.ini. See the discussion to this end at: http://forums.cnet.com/5208-6142_10... and specifically the M$ KB at: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314058 Once you are in OK - again... make a copy of the boot.ini - both on the drive (in a suitably named folder), and perhaps a usb-stick and/or a CDR/RW Keep sfe... And a hard copy somewhere safe is useful too in case you ever decide to play again...; thjat way you can always manually recreate it and copy to the c: root...?

Thanks for the replies! This has become pretty bizarre. I was able to use my windows CD to go into the recovery tool, and create another boot entry. This boot entry behaved just like the old one, in that a black screen loaded then just sat there. However, the boot selection screen came up after I added the second entry, and this allowed me to load safe mode, which I used to restore my boot.ini to its previous, WORKING state. I restarted, sure I had fixed the problem... only to find that the same behavior still existed! It was very odd because the black screen would load, then the computer would make all those hard drive thinking sounds as though it was doing something -- even though nothing was on the screen, it SOUNDED like everything was loading fine. So on a hunch, I pressed enter as though I was selecting my normal account (which has no password, so simply selecting should work... lo and behold, windows played its "logging in and starting windows harp playing sound." At that point it showed my desktop background, and my icons (and even respected my second monitor), and SOUNDED like everything was working fine. But the weird thing is that nothing else was visibly loading -- no start bar, no windows coming up. When I tried to run a program it would make a "critical error dialog" sound, and it wouldn't let me click anywhere else until I pressed enter as though to clear the dialog, but all the while it's totally invisible. I tried loading the task manager, and it sounded like it loaded but nothing showed on the screen. I even pressed the Windows button, then pressed up as though to select "Shut Down," then pressed enter. After a brief delay, my desktop faded to greyscale, JUST like if the shutdown/restart dialog were visible. It seems like some core Windows rendering program is failing to load, but I don't have the first clue how to fix it even after a google search. What gives? Update: I've been poking around to give you guys more to go on, and here's what I've found: I actually CAN see one type of windows dialog: I can see the dialog that pops up after I right click an icon and press properties. This dialog works fine. I can also see the recycle bin properties dialog, but not the My Computer dialog. When I right click on a folder and view its properties there is the normal option to give it an image -- the choose image file dialog shows up just fine and I am able to browse the file system in that way, which seems to be fully accessible and in tact. I can even actually choose an image which shows up correctly on the folder. Not surprisingly, I cannot "explore" or "search" through the right click menu -- it makes the noise like it's loading, but nothing displays. More surprisingly, I cannot create a shortcut from the right click menu, and I canot copy+ paste an existing shortcut, although I can move the icons' positions as normal. I was able to print a file I had on my desktop, but only by blindly pressing enter on what I presume to be the print dialog. Interestingly, I happen to have had a game CD in the tray, and after a while of poking around (I didn't notice exactly when), the "play game, configuration, etc" splash screen displayed. It's one of those screens that's totally made of images, instead of looking like a normal OS dialog. I tried pressing "configuration" which opens an OS dialog, but it wasn't visible, and it made the splash screen invisible thereafter. This is definitely bizarre, but it would seem like if I knew the correct files to replace, that I could do it because I have access via safemode to the file system.