Can't repair installation due to lack of optical drive.

[BlairH]

Picked up a Dell Inspiron Mini a couple of days ago. It worked fine until I tried to install Avast antivirus. When prompted to reboot, I received a message "Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt: <Windows root>\system32\hal.dll.

Safe mode says the same thing.

Normally I'd just stick in my OS disk and either repair or reformat, but these blasted things don't have optical drives, so I haven't the foggiest idea on how to repair this.

What about making an .iso of my XP CD and putting it on an external hdd and run the repair from that?

 

[swinnie]

There is probably as repair/restore function built in - look for clues on the BIOS screen.

Or, if its XP there are ways of creating a bootable USB stick with the contents of an XP CD.

 

[BlairH]

There is probably as repair/restore function built in - look for clues on the BIOS screen.

No dice.

Or, if its XP there are ways of creating a bootable USB stick with the contents of an XP CD.

Really?

EDIT: Scratch that, I don't actually have any USB sticks of decent capacity lying around. I do have a USB Hard Drive though...