I have an HP Pavilion zt3000. My friend had installed Fedora Core 2 and Windows XP and setup a dual boot configuration on my computer and I was just using linux for kicks. Once I accidentally power booted my computer off while it was in the process of loading Linux. After that, Fedora Core 2 would not load.

So then I decided to install Core 3 from scratch. During this I messed up my existing partitions (I think I gave linux just 1 not knowing that it needed 3) and Grub Loader as well, and Core 3 unexpectedly quit setup midway through the 3rd CD. When I restarted my computer, I didnt get my usual Grub interface, but rather got grub command line (I dont know how to load windows through command line). I tried reinstalling Core 3 with minimal packages and the installation completed. Now Core 3 on loading up asks me for a localhost login that I was never asked to provide during the installation, therefore I cannot load up Linux.

I stuck in the windows XP cd and rebooted the computer. The windows XP cd stopped doing anything after trying to "inspect hardware configuration" and my hard drive's light kept glowing indicating that it was spinning continuously as if it were in an infinite loop. I turned off the computer and booted of Knoppix 3.1 cd. On booting up the computer showed that have two hard drive partitions hda1 and hda2. I know that hda1 has about 100MB capacity and stores boot information, and Knoppix could not mount hda2 (which is the rest of my hardrive or close to 60GB) saying that it didnt recognize the filesystem, or that the mount was a bad option, or bad superbloack on /dev/hda2 or too many mounted filesytems.

I understand it Linux and Windows are coexisting on one hard drive partition with Windows not being able to run. I have important, un-backed up data on my hardrive through my past windows partition that I desperately need to recover.

Can anyone please help me and tell me what I need to do to get Windows back without losing any data.

Rivalmist

Use the windows cd and boot to recovery,you press r then you enter the drive like c then fixmbr or FIXMBR,been a while but it's easy,that will restore windows mbr,and then pray.

Thanks, but I already tried that. The cd does not do anything. When I insert it and boot the computer, the system gives me the option of booting from cd. I chose that and the windows Xp cd is kicked in and it shows a message saying: setup is inspecting hardware configuration. The screen stays like that for a couple of seconds and then goes blank and the hard drive light turns on and stays on, indicating that the hard drive is spinning non stop (I let it stay like that for 10 minutes and it didnt change a thing). I dont know why it would do that, but it does. Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Rivalmist

Sorry I don't know windows well enough to help,boot up knoppix and see if you can see the drive,
READ THIS
AND THIS

Already tried that too. Knoppix mounted hda1 which is like 100mb and has grub and other booting information and but could not mount hda2 (which is the rest of my hardrive or close to 60GB) saying that it didnt recognize the filesystem, or that the mount was a bad option, or bad superblock on /dev/hda2 or too many mounted filesytems.

Did you have an HP installed RECOVERY partition? may be hidden from Knoppixroot (hd0,0)
makeactive
chainloader +1
boot
Enter user & pasword created during FC3 install, takes you to commaND LINE INTERFace

dd=if /dev/hda of count=1 bs=446
will ZERO out the MBR portion of your HD & allow M$ to operate again.
Use bs=512 if you want to zero out your partition file portion!

After zero MBR then M$ recovery should run 'fixmbr' which then restores M$ WinXP as the OS

Almost 4 years ago, maybe he has fixed it?

Thanks, guys, for recovering this post from the dead. I did figure it out then, but don't remember how. However, I appreciate the response. Maybe it'll help someone else.