Matt-

I think you should try putting the hard drive into another PC; the easiest way is if you have a case which allows you to use it as a USB drive with the other system. You can also put it inside the other system on the IDE connection. Then boot Knoppix on that sys and see what you can see. You can also try the "Gparted boot CD" or "Hiren's BootCD" (google these if you need more than Knoppix.)

-Krishna

Quote Originally Posted by Stooge
Hello, I'm new to linux/knoppix

I'm trying to access/save files from an unbootable Windows XP PC (acer, oem installation, windows could not start- corrupt- windows/system32/config/system)

i have knoppix 6.2 (MD5 checksum =same, & have tried 2 cds at write sp. 7x).

(I tried it on another windows XP and loaded with "failsafe" to the knoppix desktop after 1st having a screen resolution problem (with the same monitor)but couldnt do anything at that desktop -keyboard problem...? -used same keyboard too...)

Anyway back to initial problem -I can load from Knoppix cd to the screen with the penguin and it tries to boot then says; loading linux......then loading minirt.gz.....there's a whirr then it stops and there's a single short beep

THEN comp. starts a repeating cycle of going to white acer start screen that has the option of DEL enter setup or F12 enter BIOS then Verifying DMI pool data, & boot from CD then a flash of blue screen withl ISOLINUX 3.63 Debian-2008-04-10 (c) 1994 Peter N etc and loops back to the knoppix trying to boot as i described above

I have tried many cheatcodes (some return "could not find kernel...") but it seems to be rebooting/restarting (with a beep) before linux gets a chance to boot anything

Have also tried to stop automatic restarting from BIOS somehow but dont know how to do this, (and when i disabled "power on self test" it restarted with memory test failed - dont know if that is relevant)ALSO tried "Reset Configuration Data" in BIOS -enabled ESCD...

Any ideas? Seems like might be hardware failure somewhere if Knoppix cant help...but i'm amatuer, dont know what to do with Knoppix next or if what has happened indicates something (nor what hardware to look at)

Thx
Matt the Stooge