A device driver installed in Windows XP operating system helps the device communicate with high-level computer programs. The driver breaks the high-level commands into various low-level device specific commands that can then be used by the hardware device. Corruption or damage in a device driver primarily occurs due to operating system damage, application malfunction, virus attack, or human error. In most cases of device driver damage, the Windows XP operating system fails to boot and results in a STOP error message. This error message makes the data saved in the Windows XP based hard drive inaccessible. To access the data saved in the hard drive, you need to restore the data from an updated backup. However, an updated backup file too has a possibility of getting corrupted. For such situations, you need to use advanced Data Recovery Software.

To illustrate the above case, consider the below error message that appears when you start Windows XP operating system:

“STOP: 0xc000026C [Unable to load device driver] DriverName” After the above error message appears, the boot process of Windows XP halts and the data saved in the hard drive becomes inaccessible.

Cause:

The above error message appears when the device driver file (.sys) is corrupted or damaged.

Resolution:

The above error message can be resolved by replacing the corrupted driver file. To do so, you need to:

1.Restart your computer with Windows XP-CD inserted. 2.Press 'R' to begin the Recovery Console on the 'Welcome to Setup' screen. 3.If you are prompted to enter the administrative password, then type password and press Enter. 4.Type the underneath command at the command prompt: cd windows\system32\drivers 5.Press Enter. Again type a command to rename the corrupted device driver file: ren drivername.sys drivername.bak 6.Press Enter. Now, type the below command to copy the device driver file to the Drivers folder: copy cd-rom:\i386 drivername 7.Press Enter. Exit from the command prompt by typing 'Exit' and restart your system.

If the error message persists after following the above steps, then you need to reinstall Windows XP operating system. However, to recover data post re-installation, only an advanced Data Recovery Software will help you. Such Data Recovery tools ensure maximum recovery post re-installation.

Windows Data Recovery Software is a superb application that recovers complete data from formatted FAT12, FAT16, FAT32, VFAT, NTFS and NTFS5 file systems volumes. The read only Data Recovery utility is designed for Windows 7, Vista, XP, 2003, and 2000.