XP won't boot after Windows repair

[dsigma6]

This all has to do with my post on reallocating COM ports- wish I never got into it.

I followed steps to do a recovery in an attempt to remove my Admin password in safe mode. I left recovery run off the XP disc, and left for a short time. When I returned, there was only a blinking cursors on the screen, with the CD not spinning and the HD light constantly on.

When I restart, the IBM splash screen comes up as usual. However, whether I select to boot from HD, CD, etc., it still goes to the blank screen with the blinking cursor. The ThinkPad button doesn't do anything, but that's probably because there's no recovery partition!

I did take out the HD and booted from the CD, and that worked fine. I have a cloned HD at home (minus recent work), but I didn't want to resort to that if I didn't have to.

[smugiri]

Maybe the same problem described in this thread

[dsigma6]

Thanks for the link. I read through it, but it appears to be a much different situation, as I can't get the CD to boot while the HD is installed. I'll continue rummaging through search results for answers.

edit:
I restored the cloned HD to my current HD, so this problem is "solved." Not really solved, but I'm back where I started.