New Acer Aspire One hangs up starting XP

During the initial setup of my new Acer Aspire One, it hung up on the "Select user name" screen after starting windows xp. The arrow on the touch pad works, but nothing allows me to select my user name (touch pad or button). I have tried safe mode - same hang up. I have tried eRecovery - same hang up problem. Acer service suggested sending a recovery cd - I do have a usb cd drive that is brand new but it has never been used on this Acer. If they send me the disk will it run on my cd drive? Any other ideas. Very frustrating on a new computer. Thanks for any help. Bill

 

Not sure I understand. Have you already gone through the initial installation of XP and set up a user name? When I log in to XP there is a screen that says "To begin, click your User ID" or something similar, and I click a little icon to enter my password to activate XP. Or, did your problem happen during the initial XP setup procedure for some reason, so you are not booting into XP Windows at all? That would be a different kettle of fish.

Normally, when you "plug and play" an external device like a CD or DVD drive you are already successfully running XP, and XP identifies the device so you can use it. If you are unable to get into XP in the first place and have never used the the CD drive in XP, you should explain that to the Acer tech support.

 

If the cd is a recovery disc, then the computer will boot from the disc. Before you power up the machine, connect the drive to the computer, insert the disc into the drive, and then turn on the computer. Let the macine boot to the bios screen. Then quickly press the F12 key and you should be good to go. You do not have to get to XP to use the drive for recovery.

If fact, I just did that this afternoon right after FedX delivered my recovery discs. I had accidently deleted my XP recovery partion months ago when I installed Ubuntu.

 

Thanks for your help. I did assign user names but it won't allow me to select one. Acer support has said I have a hard drive problem and asked me to send it in for service.