Fried Vista with CCleaner - now incomplete bootup.

Hi all - if you've run across my thread over in General Discussion, this is the one where I talk about lobotomizing Frankenstein, my inherited old work rig. If not, well... keep reading anyway. I'm hoping you'll be able to help.

Frankenstein (so called because when I got it home I threw in two other hard drives from an even older computer I've had in a box for ages) was running a 32bit version of Vista on an Asus P5B Plus Vista Edition motherboard. Everything was hunky dory until I decided to run CCleaner on it, because the main HD was constantly filling up to the limit and I couldn't see what was causing it. I restarted when asked to by CCleaner, which sent Frankenstein into a rapid spiral of BSODs and restarts until I shut it down completely; when I started it up again, it booted up but did not play the startup jingle or display the Windows logo - only went to a black screen with the cursor. The master HD chugged for a bit every so often, but nothing else happened.

I downloaded NeoSmart's Easy Recovery program for Vista and burned it to a DVD, but even when I instructed Frankenstein to boot from the DVD drive it refused to do so, sending me to the cursor on a black screen. Starting in Safe Mode - all three options (SM, SM plus network, SM plus command line) - got me to the same place.

I'm pretty sure I did something stupid to the registry with CCleaner, but my question is - how can I get my rig to boot from the DVD drive? Is it possible, or do I need to take this in to a professional? Or should I try locating a Vista install disk instead?

Thanks in advance for all your time and your help.

Ccleaner isn't likely to have caused any problems unless you did the registry cleaner; you where probably already having issues. What exactly happens when you try safe mode? Does it stop at a certain driver? If so which one?

I may have done the registry cleaner without realizing it; I don't remember exactly what I ran. I wasn't experiencing any major problems before that (except for uninstalling Windows Live Installer, which was easily fixed).

When I try to boot from safe mode, I get the same result as with booting normally - I end up with a cursor alone in the middle of a black screen. I haven't paid attention to the list of what I presume are drivers scrolling rapidly by when booting in Safe Mode but I can give it a look and - I hope - come back with some useful information.

I suggest that you revert to a restore point. http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/76905-system-restore-how.html