Help! During my PC boot up, it displays 'Please insert disk'!

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August 09, 2013

CNET Community

Dear CNET members,

Happy Friday! My wife is pregnant, and this morning we found out that we will be having a boy. My son, who's been hoping for a baby brother, is very excited; my daughter wanted a baby sister, but she's excited, too. And of course my wife and I couldn't be happier. Anyway, just a quick update on what's going on with me. Now onto this week's topic.

Gwen has been having some problems booting up her XP system. Each time she boots up, her computer displays the message: "Please insert system disk."

Well, Gwen, as a few of your fellow members pointed out, this isn't a trivial fix. Best put by member High Desert Charlie: "It makes me queasy just responding to your issue because there are so, so many possible problems that could cause the issue you're describing."

But don't be discouraged. In the list of answers provided, there are some fairly basic things you can do to possibly resolve the problem, like make sure there are no discs in your CD/DV drives when you boot up. Other solutions include making sure that your drive boot sequence in your bios setting is set to boot up the hard drive first.

Now if the mention of bios settings sounds foreign to you, then other solutions provided may be too technically advanced. Some of our seasoned tech experts suggest that it might be best to take it to an expert -- the first step is to ensure that your data is recoverable/retrievable, backed up, and then you can proceed to fix the problem. Read through the responses, pick the ones that you can accomplish yourself, and if other answers are beyond the scope of your abilities, the best course of action would be to take it to a professional.

Good luck, Gwen, and if you have time, please let us know how things worked out for you. Thank you everyone for your contributions. Have a great weekend!

Lee Koo
Community manager

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Q:	Help! During my PC boot up, it displays 'Please insert disk'!
Can you please help me? I have a Windows XP desktop and it will not boot up to Windows. It goes through all of the procedures and motions, then it displays a message to insert system disk! How serious is this problem? I don't want to format the hard drive as I don't want to lose my data. Where do I go from here? What are my options, besides trying a fresh install? Thank you for any help.
	-- Submitted by: Gwen F.

A:	Featured answers of the week
•	"Disk Boot Failure - Insert System Disk Troubleshooting"
	-- Submitted by: High Desert Charlie

•	"Please Insert Disk Message "
	-- Submitted by: waytron

•	"Check Your BIOS Config"
	-- Submitted by: Flatworm

•	"It might just be the battery."
	-- Submitted by: graeberh

•	"A few things can cause this..."
	-- Submitted by: bigbear1950
	Click here to read all member contributions
	Thanks to all who contributed! Click here to see all previous Community newsletters

Q: Is a waterproof iPhone coming soon? Or can I waterproof my existing one?

Hi everyone. I am a commercial fisherman and in my line of work, I get soaked all the time and I want a waterproof iPhone. I've seen advertisements about a Samsung phone that is waterproof, but I want a waterproof iPhone. Is a waterproof iPhone coming out soon? I have seen somewhere that there are waterproofing technology that can be applied to phones that will make phones completely waterproofed. And if Apple doesn't come out with a waterproof phone soon, I'd like to try the applied waterproof technology on my existing iPhone. But what I need to know is has anyone tried it and does it work and will it withstand the abuse of salt water? Please shed some light on this subject and if you have used a waterproofing service with success, please let me know who you used. Thank you.

-- Submitted by: Doug C.

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