URGENT - its getting worse!!
Discussion
Right, as you can see from my other thread, I am having huge problems...
these are getting worse.. now my antivirus stuff isnt loading up, all my icons are white with some little red and blue blob in them - my system restore no longer seems to work and I cannot re-install windows at all... I am in desperate need of resolving this as soon as possible.
Is there anyone here who thinks they may be able to help, or is there anyone who knows of an alternative computer forum that may be of use? No where that I have to pay for please, im broke atm and equally - no where that will just hack my computer or something stupid like that...
soo fed up with this thing.
URGENTLY need it working asap.
these are getting worse.. now my antivirus stuff isnt loading up, all my icons are white with some little red and blue blob in them - my system restore no longer seems to work and I cannot re-install windows at all... I am in desperate need of resolving this as soon as possible.
Is there anyone here who thinks they may be able to help, or is there anyone who knows of an alternative computer forum that may be of use? No where that I have to pay for please, im broke atm and equally - no where that will just hack my computer or something stupid like that...
soo fed up with this thing. URGENTLY need it working asap.
Right, I imagine the previous 'good' registry files are still there, you just need to be able to restore them. The instructions in this Microsoft article tell you how to do this...
[url]http://support.microsoft.com/kb/30754[/url]
...however they aren't the easiest instructions to follow (by the way I know they refer to Windows not being able to start). I've followed these instructions before when fixing some friends computers, just make sure that the restore point folder you choose is from an early enough date. BUT...another caveat is that as it points out at the beginning of the article this cannot be done with an OEM (preinstalled with your computer) copy of XP. Well...actually it can, but you'll need to make a DOS bootdisk to do the command line stuff rather than using the recovery console. Apologies if none of this is useful, perhaps if you have a
friend they'll be able to help.
Failing that, try these forums...[url]http://forums.overclockers.co.uk[/url]
[url]http://support.microsoft.com/kb/30754[/url]
...however they aren't the easiest instructions to follow (by the way I know they refer to Windows not being able to start). I've followed these instructions before when fixing some friends computers, just make sure that the restore point folder you choose is from an early enough date. BUT...another caveat is that as it points out at the beginning of the article this cannot be done with an OEM (preinstalled with your computer) copy of XP. Well...actually it can, but you'll need to make a DOS bootdisk to do the command line stuff rather than using the recovery console. Apologies if none of this is useful, perhaps if you have a
friend they'll be able to help. Failing that, try these forums...[url]http://forums.overclockers.co.uk[/url]
Edited by ad551 on Sunday 15th October 23:08
BCA said:
I cannot re-install windows at all...
Like bollox you can't. Stick the CD in, press any key when it asks you to boot from CD. Follow the prompts, format the drive when it asks if you want to, go and make tea for an hour, then restore all your files from your last backup. Sorted.
agent006 said:
BCA said:
I cannot re-install windows at all...
Like bollox you can't. Stick the CD in, press any key when it asks you to boot from CD. Follow the prompts, format the drive when it asks if you want to, go and make tea for an hour, then restore all your files from your last backup. Sorted.
Repair install might get it going again enough to do a backup if you can't coax it to use a blank CD or two to begin with.
This is the answer from computing.net
Run System Restore from the command prompt.
0. Restart your computer, and then press F8 during the initial startup & when the Option Menu appears on screen, select the Safe Mode with Command prompt option to start your system in Safe Mode command prompt.
1. Log on to your computer with an administrator account or with an account that has administrator credentials.
2. Type the following command at a command prompt, and then press ENTER:
%systemroot%system32 estore strui.exe
3. Follow the instructions that appear on the screen to restore your computer to an earlier state.
Goodluck!
Run System Restore from the command prompt.
0. Restart your computer, and then press F8 during the initial startup & when the Option Menu appears on screen, select the Safe Mode with Command prompt option to start your system in Safe Mode command prompt.
1. Log on to your computer with an administrator account or with an account that has administrator credentials.
2. Type the following command at a command prompt, and then press ENTER:
%systemroot%system32 estore strui.exe
3. Follow the instructions that appear on the screen to restore your computer to an earlier state.
Goodluck!
BCA said:
I'd love to be able to do that, but as it isnt even finding the hard disk when I boot from my windows XP Pro CD, Im reluctant to risk it.
From what I've seen on various google links, as soon as I can get windows re-installed I should be ok... I just cant seem to work it.
From what I've seen on various google links, as soon as I can get windows re-installed I should be ok... I just cant seem to work it.
Can you boot into the command line? You should then be able to run winsetup from the CD (d:winsetup - something like that anyway) and reinstall XP?
Do you know anyone nearby that could "slave" the drive for you and sort from there?
Edited by Jinx on Monday 16th October 13:00
rumpelstiltskin said:
This is the answer from computing.net
Run System Restore from the command prompt.
0. Restart your computer, and then press F8 during the initial startup & when the Option Menu appears on screen, select the Safe Mode with Command prompt option to start your system in Safe Mode command prompt.
1. Log on to your computer with an administrator account or with an account that has administrator credentials.
2. Type the following command at a command prompt, and then press ENTER:
%systemroot%system32
estore
strui.exe
3. Follow the instructions that appear on the screen to restore your computer to an earlier state.
Goodluck!
Run System Restore from the command prompt.
0. Restart your computer, and then press F8 during the initial startup & when the Option Menu appears on screen, select the Safe Mode with Command prompt option to start your system in Safe Mode command prompt.
1. Log on to your computer with an administrator account or with an account that has administrator credentials.
2. Type the following command at a command prompt, and then press ENTER:
%systemroot%system32
estore
strui.exe
3. Follow the instructions that appear on the screen to restore your computer to an earlier state.
Goodluck!
Tried, doesnt work anymore.. and when it did, it did nothing much.
Other answers:
Yup, it is detected in the bios...
Command line prompt?? - err, will ask my techie friend here (who has so far been unable to do much.)
Jinx said:
BCA said:
I'd love to be able to do that, but as it isnt even finding the hard disk when I boot from my windows XP Pro CD, Im reluctant to risk it.
From what I've seen on various google links, as soon as I can get windows re-installed I should be ok... I just cant seem to work it.
From what I've seen on various google links, as soon as I can get windows re-installed I should be ok... I just cant seem to work it.
Can you boot into the command line? You should then be able to run winsetup from the CD (d:winsetup - something like that anyway) and reinstall XP?
Do you know anyone nearby that could "slave" the drive for you and sort from there?
Edited by Jinx on Monday 16th October 13:00
Can you talk me through this as if you would a 9 year old child... seriously, im lost with this kind of stuff!
When you say it doesn't see your hard disk when starting up from the XP CD, does it start the install at all and then fail with a "no hard disk drives found"" kind of message?
Can you post the specifications & make of your PC? If it's doing the above, I suspect it's a SATA hard disk and Windows need a driver during the installation.
Can you post the specifications & make of your PC? If it's doing the above, I suspect it's a SATA hard disk and Windows need a driver during the installation.
Edited by Baconbonce on Monday 16th October 22:17
BCA said:
rumpelstiltskin said:
This is the answer from computing.net
Run System Restore from the command prompt.
0. Restart your computer, and then press F8 during the initial startup & when the Option Menu appears on screen, select the Safe Mode with Command prompt option to start your system in Safe Mode command prompt.
1. Log on to your computer with an administrator account or with an account that has administrator credentials.
2. Type the following command at a command prompt, and then press ENTER:
%systemroot%system32
estore
strui.exe
3. Follow the instructions that appear on the screen to restore your computer to an earlier state.
Goodluck!
Run System Restore from the command prompt.
0. Restart your computer, and then press F8 during the initial startup & when the Option Menu appears on screen, select the Safe Mode with Command prompt option to start your system in Safe Mode command prompt.
1. Log on to your computer with an administrator account or with an account that has administrator credentials.
2. Type the following command at a command prompt, and then press ENTER:
%systemroot%system32
estore
strui.exe
3. Follow the instructions that appear on the screen to restore your computer to an earlier state.
Goodluck!
Tried, doesnt work anymore.. and when it did, it did nothing much.
Other answers:
Yup, it is detected in the bios...
Command line prompt?? - err, will ask my techie friend here (who has so far been unable to do much.)
You could also try booting to the cmd prompt at startup amd using the fixboot and fixmbr commands to make sure the boot files are intact and then do a Disk check also
then try and reboot as normal
BCA said:
It is a SATA, what do I need to do then??
Boot from Windows CD, when it says "Press F6 to use 3rd party drivers" Do so. Either play the driver CD or floppy disk in to the system and it will load up the SATA drivers.
Windows should now see the SATA controller and all things attached to it.
Definately sounds like you just need to get hold of the SATA drivers on a floppy disk.
As mentioned, pretty early on during the start of the install (the text part with a blue background), an option pops up for a few seconds at the bottom of the screen saying press F6 to install 3rd party drivers.
Hit F6 and shortly afterwards (not straight away, it's loads some other drivers first) it will give you the option to specify an additional driver. Make sure the floppy disk is in the driver and press S and follow the instructions to install the driver (really straightforward).
When it's loaded the driver, I think it's just a case of pressing Enter to continue and the install should then continue normally.
Let us know how you get on.
Cheers
Paul
As mentioned, pretty early on during the start of the install (the text part with a blue background), an option pops up for a few seconds at the bottom of the screen saying press F6 to install 3rd party drivers.
Hit F6 and shortly afterwards (not straight away, it's loads some other drivers first) it will give you the option to specify an additional driver. Make sure the floppy disk is in the driver and press S and follow the instructions to install the driver (really straightforward).
When it's loaded the driver, I think it's just a case of pressing Enter to continue and the install should then continue normally.
Let us know how you get on.
Cheers
Paul
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