I have a Dell Inspiron 1440 that won't boot now. Using WinVista Ultimate and needed to reboot but it hangs after the Dell logo/Inspiron screen with the white status bar is completed at the bottom of the LED screen. I removed the 500GB HD and inserted a new 1TB Win7 Professional that I've been working on for the last couple of weeks and it won't boot either. Same situation on both HD (2 Win OSes on same laptop with same issue). FYI, I have 8GB RAM in the laptop (been that way for couple of years) but I don't suspect the RAM as the issue. I do have 2-2GB RAM DIMMs that came with the laptop initially in case that's a test I need to make.
Functionally, it appears like the boot sector on the HD isn't "available" but I've tried two (2) different HDs and I get the same issue. Hence, I think it's not a HD issue.
What IS the issue and what are my options? Laptop appears to be fine otherwise. New motherboard? $$??
Pressing F2 or F12 doesn't get me anywhere at startup time either.