[mac5732]

my son had the same problem, only he let it finish, he then lost everything. after cking with tech support etc, it was found that it was the windows update security program< think it was the 2nd pack or something like that, apparantly when it downloads, it corrupts all the files. Don't know if this caused your problem, but for the above, the only thing I found to prevent it, is to disable your windows update auto program and not to upgrade any of the security packs listed in the updates. He was able to recover about 75% of what he lost by reinstalling the OS, however, he did not have video or audio, He will have to reload all his drivers after he reformats his Hard drive... He installed over the current Version and had to reboot several times before he was able to access his files. He had the window updates on auto XP sucks
Glad I have windows 98 2nd ed, I have problems, but not to the number of headaches he's had with XP