This is really weird. I bought a new printer, a Brother MFC-J835DW, and proceeded to install the driver. After it finished, it requested a system restart, which I did. The system could not boot back up, and I have not been able to get it started since. It almost looks like BootIt NG has somehow been corrupted. When it gets to where BING should start, I get two lines:
Bootit EMBRI 2.01
Bootit EMBRL 2.04
The system just stops at that point. If I put a BING start disk in and start the computer, I get just the second message, but it still can't get any further.
I think I have 1.85a on that computer -- that's the latest install/start disk I have. I tried booting with that CD, a 1.85a floppy, and a 1.87 floppy I built on another computer, and they all do the same thing.
The computer is a Dell Dimension 4700 with XP Home SP3. I think I have primaries limited, though it's been such a long time since I set it up (July 2005) I don't remember for sure. The partition set up is something like:
Dell Utilities & Diagnostics partition (came on computer)
Window XP
Extended partition containing
. . . Data
. . . Backups
. . . Pagefile
Dell Recovery partition (came on computer)
I think I put BING in the Utilities & Diagnostics partition -- it had plenty of space and it put BING out of the way. I use it once a week to back up the Windows XP partition, putting the files in the Backups partition. That was last done Saturday night, with no problems.
Does anyone have any idea what is wrong with BING and how I can get my system to boot again? Could this have been a sudden hard drive failure? It's almost 7 years old, after all, but it's a strange way for a hard drive to die. If the disk is readable at all, I can get to the data if I have to put the disk in another computer or get a case for it. I could also reinstall XP if I had to, though that's not something I look forward to.
Does anyone have any ideas what I can do? Thanks so much for your help!
Nancy