> I've been given a dead laptop. Only thing is, I can't figure out why
> it's dead.
>
> When you switch it on, the BIOS runs, and then nothing happens. In other
> words, the OS does not boot.

OK, so I took a disk image and put it onto a virtual machine. Now the 
retarded Windows setup CD can actually access the drive. (The imaging 
tool notes that the filesystem appears not to have been unmounted 
cleanly. Oh goodie.)

Well, it turns out that if you fire up the recovery console and do 
"fixmbr", then when you reboot you get the Windows loading screen... 
followed by STOP 0x0000007B and a reboot before you can read the bloody 
message. Fortunately, this is a /virtual/ machine. I just have to stab 
the Print Screen button at the right moment. ;-)

(The "fixboot" option appears to have no effect at all. Only "fixmbr" 
does anything. And it complains about a corrupted or non-standard MBR. 
[It would be /really/ useful if it could decide which of those it is!] 
The laptop does have two partitions, for reasons unknown. A giant NTFS 
partition with the OS on it, and a tiny FAT32 partition also with some 
kind of Windows-like files on it...)

Next plan: Install a new copy of Windows, in a few folder on the 
existing Windows partition. When I do this, Windows becomes able to 
boot. The old copy of Windows still shows in the boot menu, but 
selecting it immediately provokes the message "cannot load 
%systemroot%\system32\hal.dll - file is missing or corrupt". Which is 
kinda serious. Again, it would be /really/ useful to know which it is - 
whether it's actually gone, or just corrupted.

I swear to God that Windows NT had an option to replace core OS files 
with the copies from the CD if they didn't match... I cannot find this 
option anywhere in XP. *sigh*

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