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[Field Marshal Dr. Opti]

I have a problem with my Laptop. It's a Packard Bell Easynote running on Windows Vista.

The same message keeps coming up. The screen tells me it is (Configuring Updates Stage 3 of 3 and 0% has been achieved.) Then it switches off before coming back on again, and continuing in the same loop.

I can't even get into boot or safe mode because the same message comes up repeatedly. Has my laptop finally gone tits up? It was purchased in 2008.

Also, if my Laptop has died will I be able to get my files from the hard drive? I've heard of an external enclosure. Is this the best thing to buy to access the files?

Any help or ideas chaps?

[TheBoy]

Its a Windows problem. Easiest solution is to rebuild. But you need to retrieve your files first.

[zirk]

I have a problem with my Laptop. It's a Packard Bell Easynote running on Windows Vista.

The same message keeps coming up. The screen tells me it is (Configuring Updates Stage 3 of 3 and 0% has been achieved.) Then it switches off before coming back on again, and continuing in the same loop.

I can't even get into boot or safe mode because the same message comes up repeatedly. Has my laptop finally gone tits up? It was purchased in 2008.

Also, if my Laptop has died will I be able to get my files from the hard drive? I've heard of an external enclosure. Is this the best thing to buy to access the files?

Any help or ideas chaps?

Yep, External USB Caddy, there are some on the market that will do both IDE and SATA depending which way round you mount the HD on the Caddy Board. Personally though, for the money you spend on a USB caddy I always buy a complete USB external 2.5 HD and remove the new Drive for your old one, that way one your have a spare/back up/storage drive, you can pick up 500Gb for less than 40 notes now, you just need the same IDE or SATA which ever is in there now.

When you get round to pulling your files off your old drive, depending OS Passwords etc, you may need to take Ownership of your old drive to view User Folders or Desktop content.

Chris.

[pscocoa]

I have a problem with my Laptop. It's a Packard Bell Easynote running on Windows Vista.

The same message keeps coming up. The screen tells me it is (Configuring Updates Stage 3 of 3 and 0% has been achieved.) Then it switches off before coming back on again, and continuing in the same loop.

I can't even get into boot or safe mode because the same message comes up repeatedly. Has my laptop finally gone tits up? It was purchased in 2008.

Also, if my Laptop has died will I be able to get my files from the hard drive? I've heard of an external enclosure. Is this the best thing to buy to access the files?

Any help or ideas chaps?

Long shot but take battery out and reconnect to mains adaptor and restart.

[Andy H]

When SWMBO's windows XP installation on her laptop refused boot past a black screen I burned an Ubuntu Live CD. Laptop ran fine from CD and allowed us to recover all her files.

Ubuntu was really usable, at that time, so we shrank the windows partition and installed it permanently. Unfortunately Ubuntu have now switched to the Unity interface which makes it behave like a tablet or mobile phone  .

Linux Mint is probably the Live CD I would most recommend to someone who is familiar with windoze and needs to recover from it's after effects  

[tgm147]

When SWMBO's windows XP installation on her laptop refused boot past a black screen I burned an Ubuntu Live CD. Laptop ran fine from CD and allowed us to recover all her files.

Ubuntu was really usable, at that time, so we shrank the windows partition and installed it permanently. Unfortunately Ubuntu have now switched to the Unity interface which makes it behave like a tablet or mobile phone .

Linux Mint is probably the Live CD I would most recommend to someone who is familiar with windoze and needs to recover from it's after effects

It's a long time since I've played with Ubuntu but can you not just install another environment on it? KDE etc?

[TheBoy]

When SWMBO's windows XP installation on her laptop refused boot past a black screen I burned an Ubuntu Live CD. Laptop ran fine from CD and allowed us to recover all her files.

Ubuntu was really usable, at that time, so we shrank the windows partition and installed it permanently. Unfortunately Ubuntu have now switched to the Unity interface which makes it behave like a tablet or mobile phone .

Linux Mint is probably the Live CD I would most recommend to someone who is familiar with windoze and needs to recover from it's after effects

It's a long time since I've played with Ubuntu but can you not just install another environment on it? KDE etc?

Or just use a better distro. People get a bee in their bonnet that it has to be Ubuntu. Its not a particularly great general purpose distro - better to use the one its based on, Debian, which is more up to date, and better hardware support.

Plenty of others as well. Fedora isn't bad, though a little buggy in places normally.  Most of the stable distros, however, have licence costs that make it unsuitable for home use

[Andy H]

When SWMBO's windows XP installation on her laptop refused boot past a black screen I burned an Ubuntu Live CD. Laptop ran fine from CD and allowed us to recover all her files.

Ubuntu was really usable, at that time, so we shrank the windows partition and installed it permanently. Unfortunately Ubuntu have now switched to the Unity interface which makes it behave like a tablet or mobile phone .

Linux Mint is probably the Live CD I would most recommend to someone who is familiar with windoze and needs to recover from it's after effects

It's a long time since I've played with Ubuntu but can you not just install another environment on it? KDE etc?

You can but..
If you are going to recommend a Live CD as a quick fix for someone with a sickly MSWindows PC it has to 'just work' 

[Andy H]

When SWMBO's windows XP installation on her laptop refused boot past a black screen I burned an Ubuntu Live CD. Laptop ran fine from CD and allowed us to recover all her files.

Ubuntu was really usable, at that time, so we shrank the windows partition and installed it permanently. Unfortunately Ubuntu have now switched to the Unity interface which makes it behave like a tablet or mobile phone .

Linux Mint is probably the Live CD I would most recommend to someone who is familiar with windoze and needs to recover from it's after effects

It's a long time since I've played with Ubuntu but can you not just install another environment on it? KDE etc?

Or just use a better distro. People get a bee in their bonnet that it has to be Ubuntu. Its not a particularly great general purpose distro - better to use the one its based on, Debian, which is more up to date, and better hardware support.

Plenty of others as well. Fedora isn't bad, though a little buggy in places normally.  Most of the stable distros, however, have licence costs that make it unsuitable for home use

Debian is my favourite. SWMBO's laptop is now running Debian Squeeze (stable). (the only problem being that she had the sound muted in Windows and we can't unmute it )

Mine is running Debian Wheezy/testing. A few months ago Gnome3 was rolled out, like Linus Torvalds I hate it  so I followed his lead and switched to the XFCE desktop.