Looks like I stirred up a hornet's nest and may have jumped the gun by posting what I did.  If this turns out to be wrong, I want to apologize for all the commotion and fuss I started.  Bill

Fact:

I can tell you that my Dell Latitude C600 has been acting funny lately.  Screen turns black during boot.  Sometimes two times in a row!!!!  That makes three C600's I know of that have this problem.  1Ghz, 850Mhz and 700Mhz.  And it just ain't confined to the C600 series either.  

Two Inspiron 3800's as well.  Just about every Dell notebook I've seen has this weird "blackout" problem.  WTF?

Simple solution:

Hit Alt-F4 repeatedly... works everytime!

[:D]

Great, I'll try it out!!!!

Now, how's about this new error which appears during boot on a Dell Inspiron 3800.

On that blue screen...
[b]
STOP: c000026c {Unable to Load Device Driver}
\SystemRoot\System32\DRIVERS\ati2mpab.sys device driver could not be loaded.
Error Status was 0xc0000006

If this is the first time you've seen this Stop error screen, restart your computer.  If this screen appears again, follow these steps:

Check to make sure any new hardware or software is properly installed.
If this is a new installation, ask your hardware or software manufacturer for any Windows 2000 updates you might need.

If problems continue, disable or remove any newly installed hardware or software.  Disable BIOS memory options such as caching or shadowing.  If you need to use Safe Mode to remove or disable components, restart your computer, press F8 to select Advanced Startup Options, and then select Safe Mode.

Refer to your Getting Started manual for more information on troubleshooting Stop errors.[/b]

WTF is all this?  If you "F8" it still won't let you enter "Safe Mode" or any other mode for that matter.  This really sucks!!!!

It looks like a video driver error of some sort.  My cousin didn't even add anything to it.

Computer now appears useless!!!!

[size=6]DELL SUCKS!!!![/size=6]

If I reload the OS, you think it will happen again?  Maybe the 32GB HD is busted up or something?

Shit, I used to like Dell before.  "Dude, I'm not getting anymore Dells..."

Thanks....

Try this (from a former Portables Tech).  Boot to the W2K CD, and go into repair, choose the emergency repair process, do a fast repair.  If that doesn't work, go into setup, and if it finds the OS and says you can repair it, do so.  It will look like you're reinstalling, but it will redetect all the drivers, and will switch back to a default VGA driver if the video drivers are hosed.  Once it's back up, reinstall the video driver from your Drivers and Utilities disk.

I tried it a few minutes ago and now it works!!!!  But do you think the problem will present itself in the future?

Uh Oh!!!!  I turned the notebook off and now I got a new error!

\SystemRoot\System32\DRIVERS\VIDEOPRT.SYS device driver...

Sales Filter
Software Helps U.S. Companies Avoid Selling to Terrorists

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/scitech/TechTV/techtv_softwarescreen020301.html

"Companies that use Vastera's product include [b]Dell Computer[/b], Microsoft, Lucent Technologies, and Novell."


The headline was a sidebar to another ABCNews article lined in another thread about the pissy French and their opinion of the US (can you say "As IF?)

Now THIS is AR15.com [blue][i]synergy[/i][/blue]