Hi,
I have a computer that needed to have the WinXP Repair done on it (due to something that happened...don't know what, exactly)...turned it off one day, and later same day turned it on to have this problem.
I started up the WindowsXP Repair and chose to Repair so I didn't lose the existing Data on it. It went ahead and began the Repair Installation, deleting some files like it usually does, got to the first screen that said it was going to Reboot computer in 15 seconds...and went ahead and shut itself down...like it should have. But when it came back up, it just kept doing the reboot thing..it gets to the Windows XP Pro splash screen where you see the graph going across....back and forth....then after maybe 5 seconds, or a bit longer, computer does a reboot. So I'm now stuck with the same problem that I had in the beginning, plus an additional problem because the Re-Installation went awry....
I don't know what files get changed to tell Windows that it's already begun a re-installation, so I can't edit anything until I find out.
PC has my customer's VIP Data on it...it's the pc that does their payroll...so it's very important that it gets repaired, rather than a clean install.
Any suggestions?
Tnx

You can add the HDD to another working computer, as "Slave" and get all the data off it before you go further if you want to be safe.

You don't need Windows to do utility testing. This sounds most like a hardware problem.

Check your RAM with Windows Memory Diagnostic Tool or MemTest86.

check your HDD with its manufacturer utility.

Download UBCD for all of these options (from my sig link) or you can get them separately. You'll need to burn the ISO image to a CD and then run the CD at the system startup, configuring your PC to boot from the CD instead of the HDD which it currently does.

Hi,
Thanks for the really prompt reply...I'll set up for making an image tonight.
Meanwhile, I do have the drive presently slaved, and all data is accessible this way, it just refuses to boot correctly, and it can't continue the Repair Installation because it crashes right after it shows me the screen that says "setup is restarting...."
The computer itself seems to be working fine with the little drive that I have on as Master now...boots everytime, no problems at all. I earlier had removed the 2 ram sticks, tried rebooting with one, then the other, no difference. I cleaned out the dust bunnies, and made sure the MBO was reasonably clean...(being very careful about static)...I re-seated all the cards..but there's only a NIC card (which Ihave now attached to my Internet connection and it appears to work fine), 1 HDD attached normally, but now there's 2, which includes mine...Video is onboard, although seems to be fine, and there is a cd writer and a dvd player installed which I haven't unplugged (again, as all seems to be fine using my own drive).
Safe mode is of no use, as the computer sees an ongoing re-installation and I can't find the correct files to stop that from happening. Safe mode will not allow an install of any kind...
Do you know which file(s) might be involved with the re-installation that I might be able to edit so that it doesn't know that a re-install was attempted?
I do beleive it had the chance to write new system files to itself before the first "Reboot in 15 seconds.." screen came up...

thanks so much for your input so far...I will check out your other suggestions now..

Also an addition: Do you have a spare computer to add the HDD to and install Windows on there?

Just as a checkup as it eliminates any further problems that maybe caused with the mobo. Just yesterday someone had this same problem and we went to long ends before seeing that it was caused by a faulty motherboard, out of the blue.

good lord...I would not have thought about that...but yes, I could take the drive to another workstation I have and put it on as a master and see if the re-install continues...(without crashing)...is this what you meant? Are you sure that by doing this, Windows XP won't see a completely different mbo and have a heart attack? Then the next obvious question would be how do I get it back on it's own computer without having the same thing happen again...as it will certainly see different hardware for a second time...and I forgot to try and backup the activation key before I began the re-install...and bythe look of it's file, it's only about 2k, I read that this is the size of the "virgin" file when first installing WinXP.....so my guess is that it already erased the one that was there....

I just tried to put the HDD onto a different system, made it master, and put the WinXP CD into the cdrom and booted...everything went along ok until the text came up to press any key for CD Boot...which I did not, because I am in the middle of a re-install, as far as the hard drive is supposed to know...when I didn't press a key, it tried to boot with the HDD...and I got, I think, a solid kind of beeeeeeeeeep...continuous... I almost thought something had happened to my Ram...I had to use the power off button and hold it in to get it to shut down...so it looks to me as if there's a problem with the boot sector?
I tried it 3 times, same result...there appears to be nothing to boot from...so I'm going to take an image of the HDD and try to ghost it onto a different HDD and see what happens next, but now I think about it, the images that i make, I use Acronis, and that will be sector by sector..., so I may end up with the same problem on the new drive.

Any thoughts on this? Any other type of image making program that will do the software, but not the sectors?

Thanks...

Originally Posted by hermit2

I just tried to put the HDD onto a different system, made it master, and put the WinXP CD into the cdrom and booted...everything went along ok until the text came up to press any key for CD Boot...which I did not

Why didn't you continue? What do you mean you're in the middle of reinstall? A full format reinstall or a repair reinstall?

This is how a repair reinstall is carried out: http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

You're concerned with the XP Repair Reinstall section.

I use Acronis, and that will be sector by sector..., so I may end up with the same problem on the new drive.

Any thoughts on this? Any other type of image making program that will do the software, but not the sectors?

Thanks...

I use XXClone which won't make the drive bootable if you choose not to. A friend of mine with a dual-boot PC just recovered from a PC problem caused by Acronis, so I'm not too fond of it at the moment.

All you need to do is try a repair reinstall following the correct procedure, all the way. You'll need your Windows Product Key, and be patient as it my seem like a full install while its not. If the repair works and the computer boots from here, your other system has a hardware problem. Seeing the situation, I'll guess it to be 1. RAM 2. PSU 3. Mobo.

The chances of 1 and 3 are 50%-40% with a 10% chance of 2.

Hi,
I have now made 2 separate images of this system, as a safety net. I am currently putting one of those images onto a different, same size HDD. It is going to take a few hours...
Meanwhile, I didn't push the "press any key to boot from cd", as that's the spot the WinXP Reinstall failed...it had done everything correctly, near the beginning, deleting files and I think re-writing them back to the drive, then came the spot where it needed to re-boot to continue, and there's where the problem happened....(normally one doesn't push any key at this point, it knows it's re-installing and will just continue)...it apparantly didn't repair whatever the original problem was, as it just went back into the re-boot loop...not able to bring up the system to the desktop...now I get the message..."Setup is restarting", and a few dots across the page...then re-boots again...every time....so it can't continue.
This is supposed to be a Repair Install, not a clean install...I can't take the chance of losing the data by trying a clean install.
Given the experience of the spare workstation having one very long continuous beep, there does appear to be a physical malfunction with this drive, although other than the reboot problem on it's own box, it doesn't do this...just reboots with no error messages of any kind.
Acronis, for me has not given me problems of late, but I have had past experience with both Ghost and Drive Image totally destroying the usability of the drives which I then had to reformat totally due to some obscure error of not being able to read the image, or write the image. In those few cases, the drives were actually ok, just the image program went bonkers.
I'll check info on the one you use...I would be happier if I could just format my own drive to be bootable and active, then try and put an image back on that does not touch the boot sector.
I have done the Reinstall procedure a few times in the past, and understand how it's done, and not had anything like this happen.
The spare box is now in progress with imaging onto one of my own HDD's and all is working correcty. This box is one that I use for repairs, and does not have any problems, so the beeping that came from the original def HDD was somewhat of a surprise...even a non formatted disk normally doesn't make that noise out of the speaker.
One other thing I was told by the customer was that just before the prob occurred, they saw the AVG antivirus window come up, saw something about a virus or trojan, then the window disappeared, so they didn't know exactly what it found. It was right after this that the problem of a reboot loop happened. It was uptodate in the virus tables...but I am wondering if it may have destroyed the MBR....or moved the boot sector location...I have run antivirus scans on all files, the entire drive, and not found anything wrong, so I'm in the dark on this one. I scanned it while it was attached as a slave drive...and found nothing...
I'll send an update when my image process is done, at least then I can play around with my own drive and not worry about destroying the original data/drive...
Thanks for you ongoing suggestions..

What makes no sense unless your HDD is corrupt is that you've moved the HDD to another computer and it still errs in completing the repair install... correct?

That shouldn't happen unless something has totally destroyed the system.

You may want to try fixboot and fixMBR in Recovery Console (Press R at the first prompt) and this is the only possible way it seems, but have you data backed up before you try this. I honesty cannot figure out what made your OS hosed with a step - it could easily be the previous failed repair install that messed it all up subsequently.

You may want to try other recovery software which will fix your MBR. Stuff like UBCD, ERD Commander 2005, EBCD, Ultimate Data Recovery, Partition Table Doctor etc. They present options to fix bad boot sectors (when slaved) and fix mbr.

Try the image by placing it on a HDD, try it first on the computer that is working fully - if it works, as long as you have backup, next try it on the computer that the problems first appeared with. Let us know how it goes.

Sorry I couldn't help anymore. Its tougher being on the other side without my 5+1 senses at work here.