Dick wrote:
>I would do a repair installation of XP, but without an optical drive, I 
>cannot do that.>>


Have you tried it? The XP disk is self-booting and has its own CD driver, 
so doesn't (obviously) need XP drivers.

You only mentioned running 1 CD---the disk may be defective. Try another 
CD. (Though that doesn't explain the Device Mangler errors).

If you have regular registry backups, try an early registry restore.

If you have an emergency boot CD (Bart CE or Ultimate Disk or 
similar---there are many of them) try that and see what happens. It may 
enable you to run the XP reinstall disk.

MSKB 929461 entitled "The CD drive or the DVD drive does not work as 
expected after you upgrade a computer to Windows Vista"  might help. 
Although written for Vista upgrades, the same registry entries are in XP, 
so it's worth checking.  Something might have corrupted your registry at 
some point before your Restore date.

Don Penlington


 From the Beach at Surfers Paradise in sunny Queensland.
Computer tutorials, local scenery,  and other things at my website:
http://users.tpg.com.au/deepend/index1.html

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