Hi guys,

I have 2 partitions on my 2.5" laptop HD, the 1st is Win XP SP2 OS partition and the 2nd is Storage partition.

I could think of 2 reasons for the boot problem:
1. I started AS SSD Benchmark test on both my partitions and because it lasted too long I clicked Stop and then End Program from Task Manager.
2. I installed Paragon Partition Manager 12 Professional Demo, it asked me to reboot after installation, after reboot I just looked at the program features for 15 min, I didn't do anything to my partitions, maybe just clicked to see Properties of my partitions. I then uninstalled Paragon Partition Manager 12 Professional Demo from Add/Remove and after uninstallation it asked to restart PC.

When I restarted PC it shows Blue Screen for 1 second, not even a whole second, it disappears very fast, more like a 1/10 or 2/10 of a second, it says:
A problem has been detected and Windows has been shut down to prevent damage to your computer.
If this is the first time you've seen this Stop error screen, restart your computer. If this screen appears again, follow these steps:
Check for viruses on your computer. Remove any newly installed hard drives or hard drive controllers. Check your hard drive to make sure it is properly configured and terminated.

Thats all it says and restarts the PC, offering to start normally, in safe mode, and other 3-4 choices but I tried all and nothing works, it just restarts itself, shows 30 sec count down to start normally by default, tries to boot, shows the blue screen and restarts itself again in endless loop.

I have been writing and saving some test results in text files on my Desktop for the last few days and I would like to recover those files from my Desktop if possible.

I think the HD is in great shape, and I think this is a software problem, maybe somehow the boot files got corrupted?

Is there some program or boot CD that can allow me to copy files, from my Desktop on my 1st OS partition - to my 2nd Storage partition?

Is it too risky if I physically take out the HD from my laptop and connect it to another laptop via USB Adapter or Enclosure and try to recover those files from my Desktop that way?
And then put the HD back in my laptop and reinstall OS on my 1st partition, while keeping the 2nd Storage partition intact.

Any advice is more than welcome

you can take out drive from laptop and connect it to external enclosure, if your drive is equipped with standard SATA connector(if not, then you Will need adapter). And copy data to safe place.

Thanks for replying jerovsek.

I eventually managed to boot with the Ubuntu Live CD and recovered my files.

Now that I am booted with the Ubuntu Live CD, can I check my Windows boot files to see if I can manually fix or remove the boot problem and make my Win XP boot normally again? Is that possible?

If I select Repair from the Win XP Install CD will that fix the boot problem and keep all desktop files intact?

hello we3fan,

before you start anything, backup your important data!!!
You can try following things:
- press F8 function key on system boot and try "Use Last Known Good Configuratio"
- press F8 function key on system boot and try "Safe mode" and then system restore
- press F8 function key on system boot and try "Safe mode with command prompt"
- you can tray with winxp installation media and select repair R. If everything is OK, you Will fix with this and everything Will remain in your desktop.

You can also try to connect your drive to another winxp or higher computer and check drive with chkdsk /f command.
Before last action, backup your data!!!!!!

Another option to fix problem is to restore registry files from System volume information (check this link https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/307545for info)
You can try with this first, but copy original registry files to safe place. And boot with ubuntu or connect to windows computer

good luck

In the Win XP "F8 Menu"
there is an option stating
"Disable automatic restart on system failure" ...

Select it and check the correct hexadecimal error ...

By the initial description I think some part of the Windows registry
got corrupted during the install/ reinstall / uninstall of Paragon software ...

Using the Windows Repair console might be a solution but depending on the registry error all the " Non-windows" programs will be erased from the registry only requireing all a full installation / repair ...

Thanks guys, I did a new clean install and all is good now.