Hi:

I have a client's machine here that had microsoft xp media center edition on it. It was not working so the client tried the F10 factory install which came with the system. It is a HP Pavilion a1630n machine. After not getting the F10 key to work the client then removed the Windows Folder from the system and proceeded to install Microsoft XP home edition on the computer. The system is working and has Service Pack 1 installed but every time I try to install service pack 2 on the system it installs and then with the windows logo screen come up I get a brief blue screen and it restarts the computer and does it again and again. I can get into the safe mode, both with and without network connection and the system seems to work fine. I can uninstall the service pack and the system will start up in normal mode with no problem. The same thing happens with Service pack 3.

Is it possible that when the widows folder was remove that the client also did something to the hidden partition? I too have tried to get into the hidden partition with the F10 key without any luck. The system stats states that there is a hidden partition with this system. I got this from the HP web site.

Is there anything else I can do without using a slipstreaming of Windows XP?

Why not unhide the partition and run its installer, putting MC back on the sys?
A simple command line tool for such a task, and many more, is MBRWiz.exe.

Thank you gerbil. I will try the command line tool. I hope I can do it in normal administrative mode.

How do I use this command if it is a recovery console command and I can not get into the Recovery console

I got this crashing after installing the service packs solved. Hp had on their website a patch to stop the computer from looping at start up after service pack 3 is installed. Got the patch installed OK and installed service pack 3 OK and the PC start up and logs on OK now right to the desktop. Every things works find now in the system. Thanks for the help and suggestions.

HP n M$. The cold war never ended for those chaps.

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