Welcome guest. Before posting on our computer help forum, you must register. Click here it's easy and free.

Author Topic: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP startss  (Read 3925 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

alyxx

  • Guest
Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP startss
« on: March 17, 2006, 01:45:17 PM »
Hi,
I edited the XP Home Edition SP2, registry in two places.  Immediately afterwards, my pc seemed to boot normally, but the mouse and keyboard became non-responsive, as if they weren't present. Hard to compute without input devices, LOL l  I can make changes in the BIOS setup area and then once Windows starts, I can look at the desktop.   

To complicate the issue, Windows stopped recognizing the CD-RW and DVD drives the day before (unrelated to the KB/mouse prob), so those are unusable.  The floppy works, and I have an additional non-working PC (both Dells with XP Home, WDC HDDs).  

Is it possible to open regedit from a command prompt before XP starts so I can unedit what I shouldn't have edited.  If so, how? Or, can I install HDD #2 as the master,  make HDD#1 the slave,  boot from HDD#2 and then somehow access HDD#1 to get to regedit in #1?  

I've tried booting in safe mode, and safe mode with logging(?)  I read the system messages in the BIOS setup, and it reported a keyboard failure. Is that significant? (It's a working keyboard).  I  changed the mouse from a PS2 to a USB connection.  No difference. Windows even recognzed the new mouse and installed the drivers automatically after one of the useless boots.  The mouse still didn't work, though.   Can I make a start-up floppy that would take me to a command prompt?  Any advice would be greatly appreciated. At this point, I'm willing to try almost anythng reasonable. Thanks
    

GX1_Man

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #1 on: March 17, 2006, 02:21:53 PM »
You didn't make a bakup copy of the registry before you edited? There may be changes there you are not even aware of needing fixing.

alyxx

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #2 on: March 17, 2006, 03:00:17 PM »
To answer the question, no, I didn't. But even if I had, it wouldn't be accessible. Unless I'd backed up to a floppy. Good point though about other changes. Yikes.

pcdoc4christ

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #3 on: March 17, 2006, 04:22:01 PM »
Alyxx:

The answer to your question is yes:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=307545

Have fun at the Recovery Console.  8-)

Doc

alyxx

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #4 on: March 17, 2006, 04:55:41 PM »
Doc, I appreciate your suggestion. Could you tell me what files are on an XP Home Edition boot floppy? I can't use the CD or DVD drives and I don't yet have an XP floppy start up disk. I could make one from the Windows OS CD on another pc, though. It'd be worth a shot. Thanks again for the help and the link.  Interesting stuff.

alyxx

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #5 on: March 17, 2006, 05:38:58 PM »
Sorry - I seem to be overdoing the bonehead stuff today.  Found the info (and download) for a 6-diskette set of XP home edition boot floppies on microsoft's website.

Backdated

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #6 on: March 17, 2006, 06:29:48 PM »
If your CD drive isn't available to access the repair console then no ammount of Windows fiddling will fix it. At that stage, the OS isn't involved.
Have you tried bringing up the boot menu and selecting "Last known good config"?

alyxx

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #7 on: March 17, 2006, 07:32:55 PM »
I sure did.  Booted right up into XP, just like always. Unfortunately, booting into XP seems to be when the mouse and keyboard lose all functionality.  :'(

Backdated

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #8 on: March 17, 2006, 08:33:04 PM »
I don't suppose you remember what you deleted in the registry?

pcdoc4christ

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #9 on: March 18, 2006, 07:17:49 AM »
Quote
I sure did.  Booted right up into XP, just like always. Unfortunately, booting into XP seems to be when the mouse and keyboard lose all functionality.  :'(

If you are using a USB mouse and keyboard, try switching to a PS/2 mouse.  On some systems, changing the boot order in the BIOS setup allows a USB mouse to work (i had a Gateway PC with that quirk).

Doc

alyxx

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #10 on: March 18, 2006, 01:02:40 PM »
I don't suppose you remember what you deleted in the registry?

I do, to some degree.  I did take the precaution of making screenshots of everything - and guess where those are?   Anyway, here's what happened: Found a forum while looking for reasons my CD/DVD drives were hosed.  In one forum, there was a post that gave step by step instructions for restoring a CD drive, from a guy who'd found an answer. There were 10+ enthusiastic kudos for his suggestion.  Impressive. (The name of the forum starts with the word "Tool" I think.  I looked for it for more than an hour last night, but no luck.  I did bookmark it at the time, but you know where that is.)

Here's what he wrote, basically:
"Open regedit,  find HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\Current Control Set ..."   That's as far back as I remember with respect to location.  I do remember, however, that I deleted the names "Upper Fields" and "Lower Fields", per his post.  Those came under one of the long alphanumeric entries with an "e325 11ce" in the middle, if that helps.  I reference his post on the chance that someone may have seen it, not to try & subtly shift responsibility for the screw-up. I'm the idiot who can take credit for that.  

Now, according to this fellow's well-received instructions, that should have fixed the CD drives problem.  I rebooted (I think), but Windows still didn't see the drives. OK, back to the forum.  Read the instructions again, taking screenshots. Decided maybe I missed something and re-entered regedit again. I found, within the same area of the reg. another couple of "Upper" and "Lower Fields", but this time, instead of deleting, I renamed them to "Rename" and "Renamed", so I could find them easily and edit back to the original name.  Rebooted, and that's when the mouse/KB wouldn't work once XP began the boot process.

In the BIOS setup (F2 on a Dell), there's an entry called "System Log" or a similar term. I hit Enter and read the entry for that day and it reported a keyboard failure. I knew the KB worked, so I chalked it up to the source of the main problem. An effect, rather than a cause.  I hope this is all of some help, and believe me, your interest is sincerely appreciated.


If you are using a USB mouse and keyboard, try switching to a PS/2 mouse.  On some systems, changing the boot order in the BIOS setup allows a USB mouse to work (i had a Gateway PC with that quirk).  

I tried switching from a PS2 mouse to a USB mouse, but it didn't help. And I also tried different boot orders.  But since the CD drive isn't recognized, and I didn't have a floppy to boot from, putting those two at the top of the order made no difference, since the system saw the HDD as the only viable boot device.  Good idea, though and thanks.

GX1_Man

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #11 on: March 18, 2006, 05:49:21 PM »
What model Dell is this?

alyxx

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #12 on: March 18, 2006, 06:46:01 PM »
It's a Dell Dimension 8200

alyxx

  • Guest
Re: Keyboard and mouse stop responding when XP sta
« Reply #13 on: March 19, 2006, 09:20:58 AM »
For anyone who might still be interested, I tried the idea of installing the second hard drive - the one with XP already on it - and booting from that.  All I got was the message "NTDETECT FAILED".  Then, I tried one of the floppy boot diskettes and got the BOOT: I/O Error reading disk. Please insert another disk.  I inserted another disk and got "Invalid system disk..."

I guess it's back to the proverbial drawing board...if i can find it.