Hi Folks,
My XP is feeling poorly. My midi stopped playing. It can't create
restore points.
So I created an XP SP3 slipstream disc, backed up my C drive. And ran an
Install[Upgrade] thinking that would fix things for me.
Well after the install, the midi was working (heard the windows booting
tune) but when I tried to log into one of my accounts it told me it needed to
be activated. When I clicked on activate now, it made the "error" noise and
nothing came up to activate it. I couldn't find any way around this.
So spent 6+ hours restoring my C drive from the back up.

Is there any way to repair my XP without having to re-activate it? I saw
some other online directions that talk about booting the install cd,
selecting install XP, accept license agreement, then it will find the
existing installation and I can press R to repair it .. but is that basically
the same thing I already did?

Appreciate some advice...

No.

Jamie wrote:
> Hi Folks,
> My XP is feeling poorly. My midi stopped playing. It can't create
> restore points.
> So I created an XP SP3 slipstream disc, backed up my C drive. And ran an
> Install[Upgrade] thinking that would fix things for me.
> Well after the install, the midi was working (heard the windows booting
> tune) but when I tried to log into one of my accounts it told me it needed
> to be activated. When I clicked on activate now, it made the "error" noise
> and nothing came up to activate it. I couldn't find any way around this.
> So spent 6+ hours restoring my C drive from the back up.
>
> Is there any way to repair my XP without having to re-activate it? I
> saw
> some other online directions that talk about booting the install cd,
> selecting install XP, accept license agreement, then it will find the
> existing installation and I can press R to repair it .. but is that
> basically the same thing I already did?
>
> Appreciate some advice...

"Jamie" wrote:

> Hi Folks,
> My XP is feeling poorly. My midi stopped playing. It can't create
> restore points.
> So I created an XP SP3 slipstream disc, backed up my C drive. And ran an
> Install[Upgrade] thinking that would fix things for me.
> Well after the install, the midi was working (heard the windows booting
> tune) but when I tried to log into one of my accounts it told me it needed to
> be activated. When I clicked on activate now, it made the "error" noise and
> nothing came up to activate it. I couldn't find any way around this.
> So spent 6+ hours restoring my C drive from the back up.
>
> Is there any way to repair my XP without having to re-activate it? I saw
> some other online directions that talk about booting the install cd,
> selecting install XP, accept license agreement, then it will find the
> existing installation and I can press R to repair it .. but is that basically
> the same thing I already did?
>
> Appreciate some advice...

Here is how to do a repair install:

http://michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

Make sure you back up your data.

well, if you only had an issue
with the midi,

then a repair installation would
likely not be the solution.

if windows were corrupted then
you would have poor performance
in the safe modes.


what may have occurred is that
the sound driver became corrupted.

what does device manager report
for the midi?




--

db·´¯`·...¸><)))º>
DatabaseBen, Retired Professional
- Systems Analyst
- Database Developer
- Accountancy
- Veteran of the Armed Forces
- Microsoft Partner
- @hotmail.com
~~~~~~~~~~"share the nirvana" - dbZen

>
>

"Jamie" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message news:8CF5A1A5-7A65-4A9C-A4CC-(E-Mail Removed)...
> Hi Folks,
> My XP is feeling poorly. My midi stopped playing. It can't create
> restore points.
> So I created an XP SP3 slipstream disc, backed up my C drive. And ran an
> Install[Upgrade] thinking that would fix things for me.
> Well after the install, the midi was working (heard the windows booting
> tune) but when I tried to log into one of my accounts it told me it needed to
> be activated. When I clicked on activate now, it made the "error" noise and
> nothing came up to activate it. I couldn't find any way around this.
> So spent 6+ hours restoring my C drive from the back up.
>
> Is there any way to repair my XP without having to re-activate it? I saw
> some other online directions that talk about booting the install cd,
> selecting install XP, accept license agreement, then it will find the
> existing installation and I can press R to repair it .. but is that basically
> the same thing I already did?
>
> Appreciate some advice...

Jamie wrote:
> Hi Folks,
> My XP is feeling poorly. My midi stopped playing. It can't create
> restore points.
> So I created an XP SP3 slipstream disc, backed up my C drive. And ran
> an Install[Upgrade] thinking that would fix things for me.
> Well after the install, the midi was working (heard the windows
> booting tune) but when I tried to log into one of my accounts it told
> me it needed to be activated. When I clicked on activate now, it made
> the "error" noise and nothing came up to activate it. I couldn't find
> any way around this. So spent 6+ hours restoring my C drive from
> the back up.
>
> Is there any way to repair my XP without having to re-activate it?
> I saw some other online directions that talk about booting the
> install cd, selecting install XP, accept license agreement, then it
> will find the existing installation and I can press R to repair it ..
> but is that basically the same thing I already did?
>
> Appreciate some advice...

Repair Installs only work in certain circumstances. But if you have a
bad case of malware infestation, then a Repair Install won't help you.

Instead, how about giving us details about your PC's problems?

System Restore issues are usually easy to address since there are
programs that interfere with it. For more info:

http://bertk.mvps.org/html/srfail.html

Playing midi files should be easy to fix. It's probably a matter of
associating the correct program to play them. If you right-click a midi
file and choose Open With..., you should get a choice of players. (Or
you may need to browse to find one.)

"XP is feeling poorly" doesn't tell us anything; you really need to
supply more information! Like the following:

size of hard drive and amount of free space

amount of RAM

malware status of PC



And here are the typical causes of sluggishness:

1. Malicious software (malware). You need to rule this out first! This
page has excellent information:

http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/...iruses_Malware

2. Certain programs that are designed to combat malware (e.g., Norton
and McAfee). Ironically, they can slow things down because they simply
use way too many resources. Sometime they cause conflicts with other
programs. And their default mode is to scan your entire hard drive each
time you boot up. Fortunately, there are other antimalware programs
available that use far fewer resources (e.g., NOD32, Avast, and Avira).

3. Too many of certain types of programs always running in the
background -- with or without your knowledge. (Then again, many programs
that run in the background have trivial consequences.)

To determine every program and process you are currently running, use
the Task Manager (Ctrl+Alt+Del) and click the Processes tab. You should
be able to sort by CPU usage or Memory usage to get a good ideas which
ones are the resource/memory hogs. You should write down the names of
all the processes for future detective work (or take a snapshot and
print it out).

Use these sites to determine what these programs are and to learn how to
configure them not to always run at startup:

http://www.pacs-portal.co.uk/startup...p#THE_PROGRAMS
http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/startups/
http://www.answersthatwork.com/Taskl...s/tasklist.htm

Sometimes it is recommended to use msconfig to configure the programs to
not run at startup. A better, more thorough program is Autoruns:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/s.../bb963902.aspx

But before you do this, you should use the preference settings of the
program in question. Otherwise, for some programs, they will return to
the startup list anyway!

If you do wish to use msconfig, it may be accessed this way:

Start | Run | type "msconfig" (without the quotation marks) | Enter (or
OK)

4. Not enough RAM, which causes the PC to overly rely on the pagefile. A
quick way to determine if this is happening is to open Task Manager
(Ctrl+Alt+Del) and click the Performance tab. Then note the three values
under Commit Charge (K): in the lower left-hand corner: Total, Limit,
and Peak.

The Total figure represents the amount of memory you are using at that
very moment. The Peak figure represents the highest amount of memory you
used since last bootup. If both these figures are below the value of
Physical Memory (K) Total, then you probably have plenty of RAM.
In case you want to explore this further, you may run Page File Monitor
for Windows XP:

http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_pagefilemon.htm

5. You might also want to check that your hard drive's access mode
didn't change from DMA to PIO:

http://www.technize.com/2007/08/02/i...while-copying/

and

http://users.bigpond.net.au/ninjaduc...duck/udma_fix/

The problem with the midi is that when I go into controlpanel,sounds and
choose the audio tab,for midi playback there is nothing selected. If I
choose something from the drop down and click ok, then go back it, its back
to being unselected.

After my first attempt at upgrade, the midi was working again, but I
couldn't activate the license.

So the root question still stands, can I do a repair install that won'tneed
me to re-activate the license ?

"Daave" wrote:

> Jamie wrote:
> > Hi Folks,
> > My XP is feeling poorly. My midi stopped playing. It can't create
> > restore points.
> > So I created an XP SP3 slipstream disc, backed up my C drive. And ran
> > an Install[Upgrade] thinking that would fix things for me.
> > Well after the install, the midi was working (heard the windows
> > booting tune) but when I tried to log into one of my accounts it told
> > me it needed to be activated. When I clicked on activate now, it made
> > the "error" noise and nothing came up to activate it. I couldn't find
> > any way around this. So spent 6+ hours restoring my C drive from
> > the back up.
> >
> > Is there any way to repair my XP without having to re-activate it?
> > I saw some other online directions that talk about booting the
> > install cd, selecting install XP, accept license agreement, then it
> > will find the existing installation and I can press R to repair it ..
> > but is that basically the same thing I already did?
> >
> > Appreciate some advice...
>
> Repair Installs only work in certain circumstances. But if you have a
> bad case of malware infestation, then a Repair Install won't help you.
>
> Instead, how about giving us details about your PC's problems?
>
> System Restore issues are usually easy to address since there are
> programs that interfere with it. For more info:
>
> http://bertk.mvps.org/html/srfail.html
>
> Playing midi files should be easy to fix. It's probably a matter of
> associating the correct program to play them. If you right-click a midi
> file and choose Open With..., you should get a choice of players. (Or
> you may need to browse to find one.)
>
> "XP is feeling poorly" doesn't tell us anything; you really need to
> supply more information! Like the following:
>
> size of hard drive and amount of free space
>
> amount of RAM
>
> malware status of PC
>
>
>
> And here are the typical causes of sluggishness:
>
> 1. Malicious software (malware). You need to rule this out first! This
> page has excellent information:
>
> http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/...iruses_Malware
>
> 2. Certain programs that are designed to combat malware (e.g., Norton
> and McAfee). Ironically, they can slow things down because they simply
> use way too many resources. Sometime they cause conflicts with other
> programs. And their default mode is to scan your entire hard drive each
> time you boot up. Fortunately, there are other antimalware programs
> available that use far fewer resources (e.g., NOD32, Avast, and Avira).
>
> 3. Too many of certain types of programs always running in the
> background -- with or without your knowledge. (Then again, many programs
> that run in the background have trivial consequences.)
>
> To determine every program and process you are currently running, use
> the Task Manager (Ctrl+Alt+Del) and click the Processes tab. You should
> be able to sort by CPU usage or Memory usage to get a good ideas which
> ones are the resource/memory hogs. You should write down the names of
> all the processes for future detective work (or take a snapshot and
> print it out).
>
> Use these sites to determine what these programs are and to learn how to
> configure them not to always run at startup:
>
> http://www.pacs-portal.co.uk/startup...p#THE_PROGRAMS
> http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/startups/
> http://www.answersthatwork.com/Taskl...s/tasklist.htm
>
> Sometimes it is recommended to use msconfig to configure the programs to
> not run at startup. A better, more thorough program is Autoruns:
>
> http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/s.../bb963902.aspx
>
> But before you do this, you should use the preference settings of the
> program in question. Otherwise, for some programs, they will return to
> the startup list anyway!
>
> If you do wish to use msconfig, it may be accessed this way:
>
> Start | Run | type "msconfig" (without the quotation marks) | Enter (or
> OK)
>
> 4. Not enough RAM, which causes the PC to overly rely on the pagefile. A
> quick way to determine if this is happening is to open Task Manager
> (Ctrl+Alt+Del) and click the Performance tab. Then note the three values
> under Commit Charge (K): in the lower left-hand corner: Total, Limit,
> and Peak.
>
> The Total figure represents the amount of memory you are using at that
> very moment. The Peak figure represents the highest amount of memory you
> used since last bootup. If both these figures are below the value of
> Physical Memory (K) Total, then you probably have plenty of RAM.
> In case you want to explore this further, you may run Page File Monitor
> for Windows XP:
>
> http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_pagefilemon.htm
>
> 5. You might also want to check that your hard drive's access mode
> didn't change from DMA to PIO:
>
> http://www.technize.com/2007/08/02/i...while-copying/
>
> and
>
> http://users.bigpond.net.au/ninjaduc...duck/udma_fix/
>
>
>

Will this repair install NOT want me to reactivate my license, which failed
for me the last time around when i did a install/upgrade?

I saw another web site that showed this same repaor with screen shots and
the screens looked just like the upgrade screens did ...so it makes me wonder
if its the same thing and will require license reactivation ?

"Mark Adams" wrote:

>
>
> "Jamie" wrote:
>
> > Hi Folks,
> > My XP is feeling poorly. My midi stopped playing. It can't create
> > restore points.
> > So I created an XP SP3 slipstream disc, backed up my C drive. And ran an
> > Install[Upgrade] thinking that would fix things for me.
> > Well after the install, the midi was working (heard the windows booting
> > tune) but when I tried to log into one of my accounts it told me it needed to
> > be activated. When I clicked on activate now, it made the "error" noise and
> > nothing came up to activate it. I couldn't find any way around this.
> > So spent 6+ hours restoring my C drive from the back up.
> >
> > Is there any way to repair my XP without having to re-activate it? I saw
> > some other online directions that talk about booting the install cd,
> > selecting install XP, accept license agreement, then it will find the
> > existing installation and I can press R to repair it .. but is that basically
> > the same thing I already did?
> >
> > Appreciate some advice...
>
> Here is how to do a repair install:
>
> http://michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm
>
> Make sure you back up your data.

"Jamie" wrote:

> Will this repair install NOT want me to reactivate my license, which failed
> for me the last time around when i did a install/upgrade?
>
> I saw another web site that showed this same repaor with screen shots and
> the screens looked just like the upgrade screens did ...so it makes me wonder
> if its the same thing and will require license reactivation ?


You might have to reactivate, but so what? There is no limit to how many
times you can reactivate on the same computer. If it doesn't activate online,
just do a phone activation. No big deal.


>
> "Mark Adams" wrote:
>
> >
> >
> > "Jamie" wrote:
> >
> > > Hi Folks,
> > > My XP is feeling poorly. My midi stopped playing. It can't create
> > > restore points.
> > > So I created an XP SP3 slipstream disc, backed up my C drive. And ran an
> > > Install[Upgrade] thinking that would fix things for me.
> > > Well after the install, the midi was working (heard the windows booting
> > > tune) but when I tried to log into one of my accounts it told me it needed to
> > > be activated. When I clicked on activate now, it made the "error" noise and
> > > nothing came up to activate it. I couldn't find any way around this.
> > > So spent 6+ hours restoring my C drive from the back up.
> > >
> > > Is there any way to repair my XP without having to re-activate it? I saw
> > > some other online directions that talk about booting the install cd,
> > > selecting install XP, accept license agreement, then it will find the
> > > existing installation and I can press R to repair it .. but is that basically
> > > the same thing I already did?
> > >
> > > Appreciate some advice...
> >
> > Here is how to do a repair install:
> >
> > http://michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm
> >
> > Make sure you back up your data.

Well actually the activate was a big deal .. I tried to do it when the PC
booted up and I got the "error" noise and the activate wizard never ran.

Is there a way to lauch the activate wizard like in safe mode?

Does anyone have the phone number to call to activate it? I looked online
and MS seems to have hidden all the XP help phone numbers since its barely
being supported anymore ..

thanks ...

"Mark Adams" wrote:

>
>
> "Jamie" wrote:
>
> > Will this repair install NOT want me to reactivate my license, which failed
> > for me the last time around when i did a install/upgrade?
> >
> > I saw another web site that showed this same repaor with screen shots and
> > the screens looked just like the upgrade screens did ...so it makes me wonder
> > if its the same thing and will require license reactivation ?
>
>
> You might have to reactivate, but so what? There is no limit to how many
> times you can reactivate on the same computer. If it doesn't activate online,
> just do a phone activation. No big deal.
>
>
> >
> > "Mark Adams" wrote:
> >
> > >
> > >
> > > "Jamie" wrote:
> > >
> > > > Hi Folks,
> > > > My XP is feeling poorly. My midi stopped playing. It can't create
> > > > restore points.
> > > > So I created an XP SP3 slipstream disc, backed up my C drive. And ran an
> > > > Install[Upgrade] thinking that would fix things for me.
> > > > Well after the install, the midi was working (heard the windows booting
> > > > tune) but when I tried to log into one of my accounts it told me it needed to
> > > > be activated. When I clicked on activate now, it made the "error" noise and
> > > > nothing came up to activate it. I couldn't find any way around this.
> > > > So spent 6+ hours restoring my C drive from the back up.
> > > >
> > > > Is there any way to repair my XP without having to re-activate it? I saw
> > > > some other online directions that talk about booting the install cd,
> > > > selecting install XP, accept license agreement, then it will find the
> > > > existing installation and I can press R to repair it .. but is that basically
> > > > the same thing I already did?
> > > >
> > > > Appreciate some advice...
> > >
> > > Here is how to do a repair install:
> > >
> > > http://michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm
> > >
> > > Make sure you back up your data.

=?Utf-8?B?SmFtaWU=?= <(E-Mail Removed)> écrivait
news:169B8C4C-3968-462A-B576-(E-Mail Removed):

> The problem with the midi is that when I go into controlpanel,sounds
> and choose the audio tab,for midi playback there is nothing selected.
> If I choose something from the drop down and click ok, then go back
> it, its back to being unselected.
>
> After my first attempt at upgrade, the midi was working again, but I
> couldn't activate the license.
>
> So the root question still stands, can I do a repair install that
> won'tneed me to re-activate the license ?
>
> "Daave" wrote:
>
>> Jamie wrote:
>> > Hi Folks,
>> > My XP is feeling poorly. My midi stopped playing. It can't
>> > create
>> > restore points.
>> > So I created an XP SP3 slipstream disc, backed up my C drive. And
>> > ran an Install[Upgrade] thinking that would fix things for me.
>> > Well after the install, the midi was working (heard the windows
>> > booting tune) but when I tried to log into one of my accounts it
>> > told me it needed to be activated. When I clicked on activate now,
>> > it made the "error" noise and nothing came up to activate it. I
>> > couldn't find
>> > any way around this. So spent 6+ hours restoring my C drive from
>> > the back up.
>> >
>> > Is there any way to repair my XP without having to re-activate
>> > it?
>> > I saw some other online directions that talk about booting the
>> > install cd, selecting install XP, accept license agreement, then it
>> > will find the existing installation and I can press R to repair it
>> > .. but is that basically the same thing I already did?
>> >
>> > Appreciate some advice...
>>

<snip>

>>
>> Playing midi files should be easy to fix. It's probably a matter of
>> associating the correct program to play them. If you right-click a
>> midi file and choose Open With..., you should get a choice of
>> players. (Or you may need to browse to find one.)
>>

<snip>

By default, midifiles are associated with Windows Media Player. If there
are no MIDI devices installed in the computer, there would be only the MS
GS softsynth showing up in the MIDI section of the audio tab in the sound
control panel. If there is nothing showing up in the MIDI section of the
sound control panel, MIDIFILES won't play, no matter what program they're
associated with unless that program has it's own integrated MIDI device
playing through the computer sound device.

To the OP

You say "Well after the install, the midi was working (heard the windows
booting tune)"

What do you mean by "windows booting tune", if you talk about the sound
Windows makes when it starts, it has nothing to do with MIDI, it is "WAV
audio" and it uses the sound device, not the MIDI device (the MS GS
softsynth plays through the same sound device).

If you don't try playing MIDIFILES or some type of KARAOKE files, you
shouldn't need MIDI.

MIDI stands for Musical Instruments Digital Interface and is a protocol
for musical instruments (mainly synthesisers) to communicate between
themselves or with computers. It's usually used by musicians or
music/film producers and sometimes in some older games.

Your sound problem seems to be associated with your sound device or
soundcard. You must figure out what is your sound device (Device manager
Game and sound device), go to the computer or the motherboard or the
soundcard manufacturer website and download the latest drivers.

Go to Add/Remove programs in the control panel, remove the sound driver,
(SoundMax, Realtek, Creative, etc.) then go to the Device manager and
remove your sound device (deinstall) and reboot.

Windows should detect the sound device and start the "New hardware
found" wizard. If the driver you downloaded before is an ".exe" file,
cancel the wizard and after Windows has finished loading, run the driver
file you previously downloaded.

HTH