Can only get blue screen at startup--think I might have screwed something up

[tim_the_enchanter]

OK, so I have a fairly new build and things had been going fine until I tried messing with stuff.  I had a copy of a Dell XP Pro SP2 cd that I got from a friend and everything had been working well.  I tried using the product key from my old XP disc for activation, but it didn't accept it.  The 30 day activation thing was running out, so I figured I'd try installing from my old XP disc (I believe it was before SP2 was included on the disc).

I put the disc in the drive, clicked on "Install Windows XP", and the computer started doing its thing.  It restarted, asked for the activation key, I typed in the old one, and it started installing fine, or so I thought.  After about halfway through copying over the system files, it popped up with an error message saying it couldn't copy "rpcrt4.dll".  I took the disc out, cleaned it, retried.  Still no luck, so I hit ESC to skip copying that file and continue installation.  My logic being that it'd be better to skip a file now, than abort the installation halfway through (I think I was wrong).  Throughout the installation, there were about a dozen files that didn't want to copy, and I skipped copying them over.

Now, I've come to a major roadblock.  Whenever I start up, the computer will go through the bios start, but as soon as Windows tries to load, I get a blue screen with the following message:  STOP: c0000135 {unable to locate component} This application has failed to start because RPCRT4.dll not found.  I've tried booting from the CD, but I just come to the same message.  There's about half a second of the black screen where you can usually go to safe mode or something, but it doesn't seem right.  There are 2 options at the top that say "Load XP Pro" or whatever--both say exactly the same thing, and the arrow keys don't seem to do anything to select one of the options.  I also tried hitting F8 repeatedly to try to go to recovery mode, but there didn't seem to be any response with that either.  Inevitably, whatever I've tried leads me right back to the blue screen and I can only reset or power down. 

I have a really bad feeling I've screwed it up pretty hard...I'd like to be able to save any data on the HDD, but it's not crucial.  Right now I'm wanting to just have some solution short of buying a new HDD and trying to start from scratch.  Thanks for any help!

[Zylstra]

You can legally use your friends XP CD, IF:
You legally own the license to your own copy.

What I recommend:
As long as you have a legal CD license:
(Of course you do)
Use your friends install CD, and then when you get the activation prompt, call Microsoft, an tell them the truth:
"I decided to install it on a different computer instead of the one I used to have it on"
They will help you with the rest of the process. If you get trouble, remember to clearly state you already have your own copy of XP, but you are using a different disk since yours is damaged.

They may at this point offer to send you a new copy of the same disk, with the same built in CD key.

[patio]

Why did you use a copy of a Dell XP CD if you had your own ? ?
The Dell CD is tied to the hardware it shipped with...according to MS it dies with that Dell no matter what happens.
You will need to format that machine and do a clean install with YOUR XP CD in order for this to work.