OT= pc help needed

[Gti]

Basically I came home from work the other day to find the pc wouldn't boot up. My sister said she turned it off properly then it wouldn't work again.

Well when you turn it on it'll go to an option screen saying pc wasn't shut down properly and you can either choose.

Safe mode
Safe mode with networking
Safe mode command prompt

Start windows normally

None of these work, it just hangs. Using safe mode I saw that it hanged at mup.sys......no I don't think that files infected, its just the last driver to load before the higher level stuff loads and the windows GUI kicks in (I think).

I tried all the usual things like switching ram, changing sockets, graphics cards etc.
Googled it and apparently quite a few people have had this problem. Tried all there solutions like removing all PCI cards, use boot disk etc. (no I don't have a USB 2.0 card)

Anyway I've whacked the problem hard drive into my other pc and hooked it up as a slave drive. Windows boots from my good one and I can access all the stuff on the bad HD, I just cant boot from it.

Any ideas?

[GFK]

Is it Win98? If so...

Boot up in safe mode command prompt and type 'cd c:\WINDOWS\command'

Then type 'scanreg /fix' - will fix any registry discrepancies if there are any.

Also, boot into safe mode and run scandisk, and do a full scan including surface scan (this might take hours depending on your HD but it can repair any bad drive sectors). Then defragment the drive (don't touch the PC at all while its doing this, otherwise it'll start over).

Could also search for and delete and *.tmp files (outside of your My Documents folder).

[Gti]

Sorry I forgot to say its XP professional and I would have tried that already if it allowed me to get past the driver loading screen.

Most I can do is fiddle with the disk as a slave drive through windows. I got it to scan the slave drive while booting up from my master one but it didn't find any errors (well I'm assuming so because I left it for an hour and came back to find windows loaded).

I'm stumped

[BIKELESS STEVE]

Whichever version of windows you were running if it reads ok as a slave in the other pc it's probably not got any surface errors (althouth you could scan it to be sure)
Most likely cause is a missing or corrupted .INI or .SYS file, possibly caused by a malicious virus. .
You could spend hours trying to find it - I would just pull off the files you need - format it and wap windows back on - it'll run quicker for it and provided you've got no boot sector viruses you'll be up and running in under an hour.

[Gti]

Well I was thinking about re-installing anyway but formattings a no no. I have way too much porn on there to back up even if I did have a back up device

How would I reinstall windows on the slave drive when I can't boot from it?

[BIKELESS STEVE]

Put the HDD back in original pc then :

To reinstall Windows XP by starting your computer from the Windows XP compact disc, follow these steps:
Insert the Windows XP compact disc into your computer's CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive, and then restart your computer. When the "Press any key to boot from CD" message is displayed on the screen, press a key to start your computer from the Windows XP compact disc.

NOTE: Your computer must be configured to start from the CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive. For more information about how to configure your computer to start from the CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive, please see your computer's documentation or contact your computer manufacturer.
The following message is displayed on the Welcome to Setup screen that appears:
This portion of the Setup program prepares Microsoft
Windows XP to run on your computer:

To setup Windows XP now, press ENTER.

To repair a Windows XP installation using Recovery Console, press R.

To quit Setup without installing Windows XP, press F3.
Press ENTER to set up Windows XP.


On the Windows XP Licensing Agreement screen, press F8 to agree to the license agreement.
Make sure that your current installation of Windows XP is selected in the box, and then press R to repair Windows XP.
Follow the instructions on the remaining screens to reinstall Windows XP. After you repair Windows XP, you may be required to reactivate your copy of Windows XP.

or visit the webpage :

https://www.jsiinc.com/subl/tip5800/rh5808.htm

[Demonic69]

Can't you stick all the porn onto your other machine temporarily?
That would make a format easier if the Win XP repair didn't work.
____________________
Back on a Blade. Just feels so right.

[Milo]

Happend top a machine where I work a couple of weeks back.
Tried every tweak and boot type then put the hard drive into a trusty Windows 2000 machine. It detected errors and fixed them automatically. Before doing anything else I put the drive back into the dodgy box and it was all working fine.

Adam
____________________
Shaft drives rule.

[Gti]

Well the good hard drive is 8GB and the bad one is 80GB. It's not just porn either, I've got thousands of songs, loads of movies, saved games.......Although we all know what matters most

My windows copy isn't legal either and although I've found the cd it's recognized as office XP in my computer

Milo did you hook up the drive as a slave to the one with windows 2000 on it?

Thanks for all the help so far.

[Milo]

Aslong as it goes in and doesn't boot (so make sure your other drive is primary master) it doesn't really matter. I'm sure 2000 or XP would do the same job.
Basically it ran a hard drive repair and repaired loads of damaged areas of the drive.
It was also caused by someone "turning it off properly" to move some cables around.

Adam
____________________
Shaft drives rule.