I am sooo angry. 17 year old daughter has just gone to US to visit friends( which I paid for) and I have just found my laptop in her room...BROKEN! It is 3 weeks out of warranty so cant send it back. there is a key off which wont go back but when it loads it says Operating system not found. Son had a quick look and tried to reload it but thinks it cannot locate hard drive. Any thoughts?
thanks

Spoke to OH, (as i no poo about computers)..keys easy to sort out, re: other problem he reckons try a full re-boot using the discs that came with pc, if that doesnt work its possible that a virus has got in, might need new hard drive or mother board..sorry couldnt be of more assistance.

Nicci

Thanks Nicci
Tried this but still the same problem. Guess I will have to find someone tomorrow to repair it :( I would not mind but I never even realised she had borrowed it. It lives in my bedroom and I hardly ever use it as tend to use my desktop.

Hello,
Is it XP or Win98?
To try this you will need boot diskette (floppy) and Master CD.

Switch on lapton and keep pressing F2 or del during startup to acess SETUP.
Select floppy drive (1st boot) - Exit and save
Put boot diskette in the A:/ and Restart
Follow on screen instruction and insert CD when prompted
(this should reinstall O/S - you will have to reinstall software separately).

Hope this works.

Try also this forum: http://www.wilderssecurity.com/  :-) Good luck!

My laptop is just 16 months old, but it didn't come with discs, if you have to do a restore reinstall, you take it back to factory settings, which is already on your hard drive.

Hi Line
The laptop did not come with a floppy disk. It is windows xp.
I have just posted on the forum, thanks :)

You should be able to download data and make your own diskette via the Internet using make of you pc, model, serial nos etc... I've done it with my mum's Packard Bell pc and it's all out there... :-)

I think Floppy drives are a thing of the past.....my laptop doesn't have one either, I think you should be able to do a complete wipe and reinstall using the operating system that is stored on your PC though.  Use the 'destructive' version, that wipes everything except the original copy of XP that was on your machine when you bought it.

>Any thoughts?

Cancel her flight home and spend the refund on a new laptop :)

Isabel, my little 11 year old is going through a phase right now and it is hard. She is tougher than we thought.
I wouldn't do something like you are suggesting to a 17 year old. I will wait for her/him to come back home and deal with it face to face.
No matter how wrong she/him did I still would feel better if my child was home first before starting any kind of confrontation.
I would be too worried that I'd never see him/her again...

You can find a laptop under less than £400 these days... Is it worth it?

You are absolutely right, what was I thinking? :)

Thanks everyone. I am not too computer literate , at least not the technical side so dont want to make thingsworse. Guess i will just get it looked at. thanks anyway

LOL! :D

;)