Hello, I just replaced my hard drive and was reinstalling windows xp pro. I installed Service pack 2. It gave me an error saying that the file Windows\inf\biosinfo.ini was missing. Well, it let me go ahead with what I was doing, however upon rebooting, it stops and says that the same file is missing and it can't load windows. It won't even load into safe mode. It told me I could put in my windows startup disc and press 'r' at the first screen to repair the file. I coulnt' get that to work. I pressed 'r' from the time the computer beeped on until the xp startup program came on. Never gave me the chance to repair the biosinfo.ifi file. I'm going to try to boot from dos and find and copy the file from my xp cd today, other than that I'll have to reinstall windows. Any other suggestions? Thanks in advance! Mike

When you get to the missing message, hit > Cancel. Can always tidy up later.

Download the biosinfo.inf (not .ini) from: http://www.infdump.com/download-inf-files_new.php/inffiles/B/biosinfo.inf/5.1.2535.0/download.html Save it to a floppy Boot of the XP CD and go to the recovery console. At the > prompt type: copy a:\biosinfo.inf c:\windows\inf reboot and see if you get the same message. Microsoft mentions this problem, but I don't think their solution will solve anything: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;829784&Product=winxp

Hi thanks for the suggestions. On my particular XP disc, when you boot from it, you don't get any kind of recovery console. I tried every way I could think to find it. I ended up just reinstalling windows. sp2 went through without a hitch this time.

For the future. How to enable an administrator to log on automatically in Recovery Console http://support.microsoft.com/kb/312149/ http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;314477 http://www.experts-exchange.com/Operating_Systems/WinXP/Q_20617977.html#8537145 http://www.windowsnetworking.com/j_helmig/wxprcons.htm http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/tutorial117.html http://www.digitalwebcast.com/2002/03_mar/tutorials/cw_boot_toot2.htm http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;307654