Mp3 player caused boot problems!

[Guinnevtra]

So I tried to transfer music to my newish mp3 player that I haven't used, and my computer will no longer boot. I have run startup repair several times, memory diagnostic, and even ran through a tutorial using command prompts, bootrec.exe, etc. I was beginning to think that my hard drive went kaput (my Acer tends to overheat), but I took it out and put it in a casing and plugged it up to my hubby's comp, and its doing fine. I do not have a disk, and my system recovery points have disappeared. I have a backup on an sd card, but only for personal files. I have no clue what to try next. I am almost to the point of trashing it, but I didn't backup my data recently, and there are some things that I can't afford to lose. Please help. And thanks!
Acer Aspire 5552, yr 2009, quad core, 64 bit, Windows 7 Ult., if you need more info, just ask!

 

[TVeblen]

To be clear, the problem MP3 player was and is disconnected during all these tests, correct?

It would help if you put your hard drive back in your husband"s PC and took a screenshot of the Disk Management window with that drive attached. Be sure to expand the window so that we can read everything there.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/9733-screenshots-files-upload-post-seven-forums.html

Where in the startup process does the system stop?

• Boot: computer starts, BIOS runs it's routine (you may see white letters on a black background, but most laptops don't show the BIOS routine), then hands off control to the hard drive/operating system boot manager.
• Windows startup: 2 parts: first a black background with coalescing squares and "Starting Windows", then a blue background and "Welcome".

To test that the PC boots, start it with no hard drive attached and see if you can get into the BIOS settings.

 

[Guinnevtra]

The mp3 player was not connected throughout the tests, I took it off about a week ago, and the next time I tried to start my comp was when I noticed the problem. The system stops when the logo appears, and flashes, it keeps doing that then the error window appears prompting me to run startup repair. It never gets to the Welcome screen. I will try to get to disk management and take a screen shot, but it may take a while, I haven't done that before. I am following the rest of your instructions now.

 

[TVeblen]

Well, that is "good". It means the laptop boots (at the system level) but is hanging up when trying to load Windows.
(I assume you mean the Windows logo when it stops, not the laptop manufacturer's logo)

That should be relatively easy to fix compared to a true no-boot situation, where the laptop is just dead.
We just need to see what is going on.