Advent 4211 Help Needed!

[Guest WizardTizzle]

Right - I am repairing a 4211 (:P for a friend's parent it runs/ran windows XP home. The user files and user account were always stored LOCALLY on the machine.

The original problem was that after some updates (so I am told) the computer would no longer log on. I witnessed the error/issue first hand - what it said was that you could not logon as the domain [computername] is unavailable.

I was unable to find out why and how it had done this, and due to the lack of CD drive, and inability to log on to the user or administrator accounts, gave up on trying to diagnose the problem. I decided to try and do a windows recovery (the kind you'd do on a NORMAL computer!), boot off the disc (in this case Tech Guys Recovery Partition). Turns out that thanks to their awful modified WindowsPE, that they have removed the ability to repair a current install. So I decided to install XP from scratch.

Before I decided to install, I backed up the recovery partition SUCCESSFULLY (according to the utility!) onto my pen drive. I then told the Tech Guys thingy to reinstall windows "full destructive reinstall". Unfortunately it crashed about 45 seconds into the process, I am unsure why.

Now to the BIG problem - after having restarted the netbook, the computer cannot boot at all - the windows boot selector doesn't work, nothing - just gives an error message

"Windows failed to start. A recent hardware or software change might be the cause. To fix the problem:

1) Insert your windows installation disc and restart your computer.

2) Choose your language settings, and then click "next".

3) Click "Repair your computer".

If you do not have this disc, contact your system administrator or computer manufacturer for assistance.

File: \Boot\BCD

Status: 0xc000000f

Info: An error occured while attempting to read the boot configuration data.

Well, I've tried booting the USB Disc by calling up the boot devices using F11 (lets you choose from a list to immediately boot off a device) - Firstly, attempted to boot with the unmodified disc - no boot

Then I copied the files off, reformatted the disc, used bootsect.exe to recreate the boot sector on the USB drive, copied the files back on, and attempted to boot again. Nothing.

Please, I am desperate to fix this laptop - I have NO access to a USB Optical drive, and NO access (or ability to purchase, lack of cash) the recovery CD from those ripoff merchants TheTechGuys/PCWorld.

I found through google that someone else on this forum had a similar problem, but solved it themselves - I hope that someone can point me in the right direction.

Thanks in advance!

EDIT: NB! I ALREADY LOOKED AT THE EXISTING 3-PAGE THREAD ON THIS ISSUE - THE LINKS TO THE MSI-WIND FORUM ARE DEAD - CAN'T EVEN SEEM TO NAVIGATE TO THE MSI-WIND ROUTE...BUT I READ THAT THERE ARE USERS WITH DIRECT ACCESS TO THE RELEVANT FILES...HINT HINT :D

Edited October 27, 2009 by WizardTizzle

[Guest pd.ryder]

My post #42 here contains a still-live megaupload link to the files.

Good luck, but it sounds like there's more wrong than just the boot sector if you can't get the image to boot off the USB.

[Guest WizardTizzle]

 Feel free to delete this thread - problem solved!

[Guest pd.ryder]

Feel free to ventilate... how did you do it exactly?