Cannot Find Windows 2000 Installation

[Chiropter]

When I connected another SATA drive to my existing Win2K SATA computer, the computer crashed. (I don't know why.) So I removed the added drive and started with the original HDD only that was working normally, the computer failed to boot. But when I restarted in SAFE mode, it worked.

So I thought there was no serious problem and restarted (usually one SAFE mode operation automatically fixes this kind of problem), but it crashed again
in Normal mode.

Finally I decided to repair the problem whatever it may be using Win2K CD and used R/F. Then I got an error message: Cannot find a Windows 2000 Installation to repair. This seems strange because it works in SAFE mode indicating the HDD definitely contains a pretty complete Windows 2000
.
Why does not CD find the installed Windows 2000?
What can I do to fix the problem?
(I do not have an Emergency disk. If I need to add/remove/change certain files, can I do it via Console?)

 

[Pointertovoid]

Puzzling situation indeed.

I wouldn't invest more time in analysis. Use your Cd to reinstall W2k without formatting the disk. It will reinstall only the OS, keeping your documents, applications (and maybe your drivers, which wouldn't necessarily be desirable).

Of course, save you documents before.

What you lose in this process:
- All tuning, like Explorer folder options
- Newer DirectX, Media Player, Internet Explorer... To be reinstalled.

Such situation is one more good reasons to have a HfSlip'ed installation disk.

 

[Chiropter]

Thanks for the time you kindly considered my problem.
After I posted the problem and because I exhausted means, I hit upon an idea that the problem might be a conflict between the onboard hardwares and the the windows stting up. To see if this might be the case, I transferred the HDD to another computer that has a completely different set of hardwares. To my surprise, it booted to Normal mode without any change (though I lost all drivers.).
So I put back the HDD to the original computer and booted to Safe mode. I checked the device manager for suspicious devices. One was network adapter that had no drivers installed (It had drivers before.) So, for a test, I uninstalled this device completely. Holding my breath I turned on the computer and wayched the screen. It came to Windows logo and the progress bar progressed to the end. Before it crashed at this point, but I saw the familiar desktop screen appearing. Bingo!
Although I do not have an Internet access right now, the computer works otherwise.
Why the MS programmer set up the scaring error message like no Windows installed when the problem is just an device driver problem--I wonder.