I just recently installed XP Home on a person at my work's laptop, but the install didn't seem to go very well. Once I got through all of the installation steps and booted the computer back up, the screen flashed really fast with something I couldn't read. The computer then reset and all I would get is blue screen with weird skinny black bars on the sides and it would just sit there. Then I created a boot disk from my own work computer and used that in the laptop upon start up and it began to load, but right before it got the screen in which it says “Windows is Starting up (the one with the Users)” a login style box, along with a pop up that I couldn't read but has a button in the middle, would flash really quick. It would then go to the "Windows is Starting up" page and just hang there forever without showing the Users. I finally figured out that I needed to click that button that popped up for a split second, so I put a piece of tap on the screen where the exact location of the button was and when I can time it right I can click the button. The login box says something about Administrator in the drop down menu, but it goes too fast and I can't read it. Windows then goes through the normal XP User screen with out hanging up and I can get into Windows. The first thing that pops says "Installation Failed" with an OK button, which if clicked does nothing. I can run everything in XP just fine while I'm in it, it is just every time I have to reboot or turn the computer back on that I have problems. I upgraded it from Windows 98 SE.

Can you go into the bios and set your PC to boot from CD Rom. I would go ahead and do a reinstall of the operating system.