No more OSX, XP won't install. HELP!

S

stupidnewbie

Registered
I think I may have just killed my iMac. :eek:

I updated all my firmware, ran bootcamp, burned the drivers cd, and partitioned 30 GB for the XP installation.

I insert my Windows cd. Reboot as per instructions. Get Blue Screen -- it wants me to choose a partition to install to. I select C. (It's the only partition listed.) It says to format to either NTFS or NTFS quick. I select NTFS. It begins formatting the partition.

Next it starts installing the Windows files. Once it's completed, it says it will reboot in 3 seconds. It reboots. It brings me back to the ORIGINAL BLUE SCREEN. It wants me to choose a partition again. I choose C again. It says there's already a Windows installation there, do I want to delete it and reinstall. No! Do I want to reformat it? No! I choose to leave the file system as is, and it deletes the old Windows installation and overwrites a new one on top of it. Then it reboots again. I get the same Blue Screen.

I seem to be stuck in an endless loop. Worst of all, when I hold down the alt/option key while the computer's rebooting, there is no OSX option. It just shows "Windows" with a little arrow underneath it. And when I click that I'm taken back to the Blue Screen.

Help. Please.
 
I know that this is going to sound absurdly simple, but did you remove the Windows installation disk prior to rebooting?

I knew someone (who should have known better) that was ranting and raving about a similar situation and that was all that they needed to do.

Hope this is some help.

David
 
Hey David,

When I eject the cd, the screen goes black and there's a blinking white cursor in the upper left corner. The keyboard and the mouse don't respond.

I rebooted without the cd, held down the option key and the Windows icon popped up with the arrow. I clicked the arrow and was taken back to the black screen... this is different from yesterday when I always got the Blue Screen, so I think you're right about that.

Either way, I can't seem to get into either OS...

Thanks for your input,
Dawn
 
Sorry to hear that it wasn't that simple (I was afraid it wasn't).

Hopefully someone with more experience will chime in soon.

Have you tried booting up off the Mac OS X install disk that came with your computer? If you can, you might be able to gain access to your hard drive and see what happened during the installation process to foul things up.

Hope this helps,
David
 
Sorry I didn't reply sooner.

I think I had a bad copy of XP ( I was using the reinstallation cd from my Windows machine). I got another copy and was able to install Windows, but unfortunately OSX was completely trashed.

Fortunately I had my most important files backed up on my iPod, so once I figure out how to transfer those, everything should be fine.

Thanks again for your help!
 
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