I'm trying to fix my brother's Dell laptop for him. He originally was unable to get into Windows (the screen would display "NTLDR not found" after boot), so I was able to repair the Windows XP installation from the Reinstallation disc that came with the system.
After restoring Windows from the disc, the system seems to work completely fine - that is, for just the first boot into Windows (the one that occurs after the initial Windows installation, when the setup program restarts your PC). On any subsequent boot into Windows, the system freezes about 60-90 seconds after startup - no response to keyboard or trackpad input.
- Is it possible that a missing Dell driver could cause this type of behavior? (If so, why is the initial boot into Windows after the reinstallation ok?)
- What types of problems could cause a hard freeze like this? Could it be hardware related? (again, if this is the case, I'm really stumped on why the initial boot into Windows is fine)
- Can anyone offer any sort of tips as to what to look into to identify the cause?
- Or are there so many different possible types of causes to this problem that this question is essentially unanswerable?