internetdemon

Problem solved! It was the CMOS battery that was flat. They are a pain to get hold of the right replacement ones though, soo many different code numbers :S

Ive managed to boot the machine from a BarPE disc, all the new windows files are there on the hard drive. Just looks like its failing to boot from it. Looks like the CMOS battery being dead is the cause. Im making a DOS CD to check the partitions now...

This has really got me stumped; but here goes. Ive installed Windows XP Professional on a 2nd Hand (ebay) Compaq Evo 610c laptop using the recovery discs that came with it. All works fine, until I shut it down and take the power cable out - when it boots with a "Non system disk or disk error", and the hard drive is seemingly blank. Ive noticed the battery does not charge, and the BIOS clock thinks its 1980, but I've never heard of a hard drive nuking itself when you remove the power. Has anyone else heard of this or had it happen to them?

Thanks guys, i wont be needing to sort it at all now, in true Dell style, the LCD inverter on the screens died. Its been put to good use as a doorstop though.

Hi all, i seem to be having a problem with a Vista laptop that thinks it doesnt have a genuine copy of windows (it does, as it was bought new from dell, preinstalled) it now logs on, complains about the license, then shuts down again . The license key on the COA sticker is also refused when trying to re-validate. Anyone have any ideas why its suddenly decided to do this? Or how without (god forbid) phoning microsoft, i can solve it?

Ive just this second had the power off/on lecture from virgin technical 'support'. Im almost certain this wont fix the fact all of the buttons on my STB acting like power buttons. The next grand idea was; "just use the remote" Nice try, but a box that actually works would be nice...

How about blocking all SWF files for users who don't need them? Im guessing students making flash files are in the higher years (and should know better than to play games on school time?). ...Block flash files for everyone, but dont apply it to a certain group of users. This would probably create a lot of extra work unfortunately:mad:

Mines: Windows Server 2003 (DNS, RAS, TS, IIS, File Server, Print Server) SuSe Linux Enterprise Server 10 (Squid, SquidGuard, SAMBA) XP Pro (With VMWare Server running a 'test' domain)