menu problem vista

here is a video on what happens when i select "English" -it automatically scrolls to the bottom of the list (Japanese)-This also happens with scroll bars in Safe Mode before I started the reinstallation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CWt

Though I suspect it to be a deeper problem I tried both Vista Premium 64 and 32 disks-Same problem.
I am able to format but I am only seeing PART of the drive ~232GB (its a 250 GB Hard drive-the difference is much more than I expect for drive management of whatever the drive steals for itself)- It says "partition 2" but does not show me what's on partition 1 or 0, however it should be labeled. I formatted the disk a few months back but I had left a few GBs unformatted-this is what i think accounts for the missing part-yet I don't see it during the installation. Strange thing-just before stability issues arose in Windows-during boot up it started prompting to select an OS-but I had only installed one OS (single boot!)-and this did NOT begin soon after my last reinstall-just wondering if something was surreptitiously installed on the unpartitioned space without my consent!???
When I go into DOS from the installation disk I see a volume "x:" with about 4 folders. I run the DEL command on these folders and it returns "access denied" . When I run the FORMAT command on the volume "x:/" it prompts for its label- which i found out to be "boot" by running the DIR command on x:/ . However once I supply the label "boot" to the prompt after I tried to format-i say it cannot format-"disk is write protected." Short of removing the disk to an external enclosure to have access to the entire 250 GB (less HDD management space) -i am looking for a software solution.

Hi welcome to the forum.
Sorry to hear of your problems. A number of things have gone wrong, could you, are you able to:-

AV & Malware.
First, to assist in the elimination of possible virus and/or malware.
I would ask you to please use your Anti-virus full scan program facilities, making sure, you have updated the software first. Please advise us of the results.

If you do not have any anti-virus loaded please go to this link and download Microsoft Security Essentials :- Anti-Malware, Virus, Spyware Protection | Microsoft Security Essentials

Secondly, please download:- malwarebytes Malwarebytes a Malware searching program, again, an updated full scan. Notify results please. Both these programs are Freeware
Thank you.

hey thanks for the Welcome and quick response! Yes I install have MalwareBytes and Symantec Endpoint Protection AV on all of my computers. The laptop giving the problem is currently already backuped and I was able to format the partition where I had windows installed. However before deciding to reinstall I did run MB an a full scan with as many options as i can with Symantec-both found nothing, and each took over 5 hrs. I will check my backup for the log files and post.
One thing i found strange during the installation is that after formating the 232 GB i see (its a 250 GB drive) the option to create partition is not active -seems like this is normally active on the several reinstalls and reformats that I have done. I wonder how this is related to the space I left unpartition last time (~15-18 GB)

well my mistake-actually 232 GB should be correct when i do the calculation- (250 x10^9 B)/(2^30 B/GB) =232.83 GB, which is close to what I see. So that means most of the majority is seen during the installation but the issue of not being able to select item on two different disks remains baffling. I removed the drive to an external enclosure and deleted the eisa partition (39 MB) -current plan is to replace the disk without partitioning/formating to laptop and see if that works...

problem still there-the drop menu is unstable and default to the last entry (Japanese)

I have tried 3 disk so far (Vista Home Premium 32 & 64, and Vista Home Basic 32)-with the exact same result. All 3 disk are in good condition with shiny surfaces. Not sure what this is-firmware on the mobo? seem like something beyond the hard drive or installation disk-but i have reached the limits of my knowledge on how the installation works...

Apologies for the lateness of the reply.
Please find link with information regarding Dell installations.
How To Restore or Reinstall Microsoft® Windows® on a Dell
Thank You.

Looks like a good idea-unfortunately I had deleted the partition before getting to your message-though in retrospect I am not certain if it would have been successful as chkdsk and a disk management utility from WD(the HDD manufacturer) found several errors, damaged sectors, etc and both froze for hours attempting repairs. Before I got your message, I saw and "EISA" partition labeled "X:" and I knew I didn't put it there so I deleted everything with DISKPART having my mind set on a fresh start! (not sure why Dell would hide it so deeply and not put something on the desktop or elsewhere to let users know of that option). Right now I am just going to swap the HDD.Thanks.

Hi,
Sorry in some ways I didn't make it in time!
However, if you had your mind set on a fresh start!
Not sure why Dell does that actually either?
Good luck with the HDD change & if there is anything we can do for you here on The Vista Forum
please post us.
Thank you for keeping us informed of your progress.
Cheers.
kesume