Hey everyone! New to the forums here (introduced myself a bit over in the Intro thread) but I'm just going to dive right in with the problem at hand.
I recently inherited my old work computer from my job (we got shiny new equipment for everyone!) and have been trying to clean it up at home for the past couple days. I managed to add two other hard disks from an even older computer I had sitting around (ran on XP) and successfully formatted both of them as slaves.
Frankenstein (as I call it now) is running Windows Vista off an Asus P5B Plus motherboard and some form of Intel Core 2 processor (wasn't able to identify which one specifically before the problems arose) and an unknown graphics card.
All seemed to be going well until I downloaded a copy of CCleaner and had it sweep through the master disk after uninstalling a lot of identifiable junk (and, accidentally, Windows Live Installer, but that got easily fixed). I also had it sweep the free space on all three disks but interrupted the process after it had completed the C: drive. Once I'd finished everything it asked to restart the computer... and that's when all hell broke loose. It collapsed into a cycle of BSOD and restarts until I shut it off completely; now when I start it, it loads up to a certain point where I can see the cursor and an otherwise black screen, and then it just sits there. The HD runs occasionally but I get no startup music or Windows logo.
I downloaded the NeoSmart ER onto a DVD but Frankenstein won't boot from the DVD drive even when I press and hold F8 and tell it to from the screen that pops up.
That's where things stand now. Is there anything I can do on my own, or is it time to bring the master HD in to a doctor? (I'm pretty sure it's the HD, as I had no other apparent issues with any other hardware until the collapse.)
Thanks in advance for any help you all could provide!
I recently inherited my old work computer from my job (we got shiny new equipment for everyone!) and have been trying to clean it up at home for the past couple days. I managed to add two other hard disks from an even older computer I had sitting around (ran on XP) and successfully formatted both of them as slaves.
Frankenstein (as I call it now) is running Windows Vista off an Asus P5B Plus motherboard and some form of Intel Core 2 processor (wasn't able to identify which one specifically before the problems arose) and an unknown graphics card.
All seemed to be going well until I downloaded a copy of CCleaner and had it sweep through the master disk after uninstalling a lot of identifiable junk (and, accidentally, Windows Live Installer, but that got easily fixed). I also had it sweep the free space on all three disks but interrupted the process after it had completed the C: drive. Once I'd finished everything it asked to restart the computer... and that's when all hell broke loose. It collapsed into a cycle of BSOD and restarts until I shut it off completely; now when I start it, it loads up to a certain point where I can see the cursor and an otherwise black screen, and then it just sits there. The HD runs occasionally but I get no startup music or Windows logo.
I downloaded the NeoSmart ER onto a DVD but Frankenstein won't boot from the DVD drive even when I press and hold F8 and tell it to from the screen that pops up.
That's where things stand now. Is there anything I can do on my own, or is it time to bring the master HD in to a doctor? (I'm pretty sure it's the HD, as I had no other apparent issues with any other hardware until the collapse.)
Thanks in advance for any help you all could provide!