HDD crash causes a panic

Greetings,
Well, yesterday I turned my PC on and I got a blank screen with the words:- Windows has shut down your computer to save from further damage. Please insert your windows XP disc and press 'r' to recover.
Now, the thing is that I couldnt even get to press F8 to try a previous restore point. It just died. After hours of screwing around I isolated it to the pagesys file on the C drive.
Well, yesterday I turned my PC on and I got a blank screen with the words:- Windows has shut down your computer to save from further damage. Please insert your windows XP disc and press 'r' to recover.
Now, the thing is that I couldnt even get to press F8 to try a previous restore point. It just died. After hours of screwing around I isolated it to the pagesys file on the C drive.