Recover XP using Linux CD

[emmjay]

Originally Posted by wdhpr

Did all system components include the HDD (device 0)? I'm leaning towards a HDD issue. The only question I have is, were you ever able to repair your MBR or were you unable to get that far.
One other thought this could be as simple as a loose connector to the HDD.

Yes it did, about 6 different tests: seek tests, surface tests, access tests etc etc. They all passed. When I attempted to repair the MBR, I used the Paragon Recovery CD. The BOOT CORRECTOR apparently fixes both the boot sector and the MBR (got to get it all pointing to the boot manager in XP ... if I understand all this stuff OK) It said that it completed both tasks successfully, however on restart the same BSODs followed, so I looked for another approach. I came across MBRfix.exe and downloaded it to a CD. It looked really promising, but I could not figure out how to get it to run in administrator mode from WINPE. One needs an MBA to change an MBR.

[Anupam]

Ah, finally the BSOD error code is here .

There can be several reasons for this particular BSOD. Did you make any change to the hardware setup recently, which might have caused this?

Or, it might just be an issue of MBR... which can be fixed by fixmbr, and fixboot command. If you can get an XP CD from one of your friends maybe, then you can run these commands by booting from that CD.

Or, it can also be an issue of MBR virus. In that case, you can download the Kaspersky rescue CD, and run a scan.

Have a look at this page, where several reasons are given for this error.

http://pcsupport.about.com/od/findby...0x0000007b.htm

My suggestion would be to try to get an XP CD from your friends.

[emmjay]

Originally Posted by Anupam

Ah, finally the BSOD error code is here .

There can be several reasons for this particular BSOD. Did you make any change to the hardware setup recently, which might have caused this?

Or, it might just be an issue of MBR... which can be fixed by fixmbr, and fixboot command. If you can get an XP CD from one of your friends maybe, then you can run these commands by booting from that CD.

Or, it can also be an issue of MBR virus. In that case, you can download the Kaspersky rescue CD, and run a scan.

Have a look at this page, where several reasons are given for this error.

http://pcsupport.about.com/od/findby...0x0000007b.htm

My suggestion would be to try to get an XP CD from your friends.

I definitely caused the error. It is not a virus. I hit restart before a defrag had completed. I was not installing any new hardware or software, but I was deleting unwanted APPS at the time ... impatience was my vice. I caused a major data corruption situation. I do not know how the boot device became inaccessible, but it did. My windows drivers folder may have become unavailable during the defrag (guessing here) and the restart left the MBR/VBR inaccessible.

I must agree with you though ... I need an XP installation CD. XP needs a miniport driver to communicate with the disk controller that is used to reboot the computer and the installation CD provides that. All my friends have preloaded systems, like I do ... no XP installation CDs in sight. WINPE or BARTPE seems to be the only alternative but I am not making any headway with this as a solution.

It is my own fault, so I have to live with the consequences. Tnx for your help. I have learned a lot over the past few days and I now have access to links that I never knew existed before .... and that is a good thing about this site.

[4goTTen21]

Originally Posted by emmjay

I hit restart before a defrag had completed. .

Then MBR is OK, boot files in FAT are not correlative. Sorry, rewriting FAT manually is closest to impossible. Install from CD again. You really need it.