Can Anyone out there Help me....

[Er!c@]

My sister has a Toshiba Satellite that just wont boot. It keeps getting a stop error. Ive gone through and tried booting in safemode, safemode with command, normally, system restore. And I have come to the conclusion that my only way to get it working is to format it and get it back to its original factory settings. But heres the hold up, she has no cd or cdrom, or floppy. I always thought you could go through the bios and so it, but when i go to what i think is the bios it has me press f1 for default settings than restarts where it wont boot.


so basically im asking is there anyway i can format the c drive without a cd, cdrom or floppy... and howw to go about this.


help 

[[BTF] Reflex]

I too have a toshiba satelite,  it's in the closet and won't get even as far as yours with booting
I fried mine fudging with either the bios or video drivers.

You can format it,  but I'm not sure what you would do next without a cd drive 
Mine had a cd drive.

The windows on mine crapped out much like yours,  and safemode with command prompt didn't even work.
The only luck I had after that was popping in the xppro disk and reinstalling

Have you been to the toshiba laptop forum?  I didn't find much on my problem,  but there is a lot of information/knowledgeable ppl  there.
http://laptopforums.toshiba.com/

[peewee_RotA]

I spoke with a salesman for a similar device once. Basically you're supposed to use a USB drive to reinstall. Believe it or not, most modern MOBOs will recognize those during bootup and they can be made bootable.

I think that the proper way is to send it back to a repair associate and have them do it, but they will most likely charge for it. 




P.S.

2001 posts.. a quake odyssey!

[RRBM [NL]]

What is the precise description of the stop error ? You get a BSOD (blue screen of death) ? Sometimes there is a recovery key like F10 (depends on brand, visible during boot something like "Press <key> to restore") or something to access the (hidden) recovery partition on the hard disk (e:\ most used drive letter by OEM installations) if it is a OEM windows installation. You can find this in your manual. That way you dont have to use a floppy or cd/dvd drive. What is the precise modelname of your toshiba satellite ?

[QwazyWabbit]

No CD, CD-ROM, floppy drives or the installation media disks?

You can't repair a damaged system if you don't have any of the above. You must have an installation CD and a compatible drive to get the system repaired. Depending on the vintage of the computer, you may also need a bootable floppy to get the system started. There are Win98 and other boot floppy sets on the net that can get you started on the road to recovery. Google "boot floppy".

Toshiba used to ship CD's of the distribution system with the machine, find those, fix the system.

I have an old Satellite that won't boot either. The batteries died and the Lithium battery inside died as well. I attempted to access the data on the hard drive and no other system understands the hard drive, (media not recognized). It was an old Win98SE system and it seems that Toshiba uses some kind of proprietary media descriptor on their hard drives. No system I have found yet can recognize it. If anyone out there has a utility for this, I'd love to know where to download it.

[reaper]

Do you get the stop errors in safe mode?

If you don't, run AVG and uninstall what you think might be the issue.


Have you changed a hard drive, or added any hardware?


You can bootstrap the system over the network, so you can load an Operating System into memory without a CD drive, but it would be a bit of a pain, more than adding a USB CD rom?

[ToxicMonkey^MZC]

USB CD ROM.  That seems the most obvious solution.  Hopefully the OS you put on will have some kind of generic ethernet drivers which work so you can get online....and get everything else

[UUD-40]

A large hammer should do the trick.

[CodeBlack]

A large hammer should do the trick.

[ReCycled]

A large hammer should do the trick.

This would be my solution too, after a few failed attempts to get it running. A hammer is good, but a mighty downward throw onto concrete would be acceptable as well. An excellent release on an evil product whose only reason to exist is to torment you.

That and a lifetime vow to never purchase a Toshiba product again.
  

[QwazyWabbit]

That and a lifetime vow to never purchase a Toshiba product again.

I took that vow in 1999. Ten years and still sober.

[Er!c@]

What is the precise description of the stop error ? You get a BSOD (blue screen of death) ? Sometimes there is a recovery key like F10 (depends on brand, visible during boot something like "Press <key> to restore") or something to access the (hidden) recovery partition on the hard disk (e:\ most used drive letter by OEM installations) if it is a OEM windows installation. You can find this in your manual. That way you dont have to use a floppy or cd/dvd drive. What is the precise modelname of your toshiba satellite ?

we bought the laptop on ebay, from a buyer we have gone through for a long time, anyway, when you hit the start button it says windows had a problem starting up or something like that. Than it asks if you want to start normaly, restore from the last clean reboot, in safe mode, and safe mode with command prompt. every option just flashes a bsod, and restarts just to the previous screen.
 all the f keys do nothing, esc brings up 'press [f1] for default settings."


we are gonna try the formating with the usb drive, and if that doesnt work we are just gonna beat the thing with a bat and get her a new one.

[[BTF] Reflex]

beat the thing with a bat and get her a new one.

Take pictures..  If I don't get mine back up and running this winter we are gonna take it to the shooting range.