BSOD C0000218

[Noel S Pamfree]

A friend is getting the dreaded BSOD with the STOP C 0000218.

His laptop works under Windows 2000 and it won't start in Safe Mode.

I have done some research on the Net and gather that there is something
called a 'hive' file (SOFTWARE) missing.

He desperately wants to save the photographs on his hard drive and the
rescue disk warning says all data will be lost.

Any ideas as to how we can solve this problem.

Noel

 

[John John]

Several different ways to possibly fix it.

See here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/269075/

If you are certain that the problem is with the Software hive, where you
see references to the "system" hive in the article replace it with with
"Software". Example:

copy C:\WINNT\repair\RegBack\Software c:\winnt\system32\config\

or

copy c:\winnt\repair\Software c:\winnt\system32\config\

How to perform a parallel installation of Windows 2000 or Windows Server
2003
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/266465

How to perform an in-place upgrade of Windows 2000
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/292175

Don't use the restore disks! As you already know that will wipe the
disk and all the information on the disk will be lost. Use a real
Windows 2000 cd or even a Windows XP cd if no Windows 2000 cd is
available. You won't need to activate XP, you only want to access the
files on the drive and recover/copy them to a safe location. Once the
files have been properly backed up to another location you can then use
the restore disks if needed.

You can also remove the hard disk from the laptop and put it in a USB
enclosure and access the files on the disk with another computer.

John

 

[Dave Patrick]

If the software hive is corrupt, it may be possible to rename the software
hive found in;
%systemroot%\system32\config\software
to software.old
then copy the most recent backup found in
%systemroot%\repair\regback
as
%systemroot%\system32\config\software

If that fails you can copy/ use the file
%systemroot%\repair\software
This file is an image of the hive at the time the OS was installed, so you'd
have to reinstall all software. This being the case you might just as well
blow it away and start a new install. (note: this would at least allow you
to start the OS to make any necessary backups prior to wiping the drive.)

To start the Recovery Console, start the computer from the Windows 2000
Setup CD or the Windows 2000 Setup floppy disks. If you do not have Setup
floppy disks and your computer cannot start from the Windows 2000 Setup CD,
use another Windows 2000-based computer to create the Setup floppy disks. At
the "Welcome to Setup" screen. Press F10 or R to repair a Windows 2000
installation, and then press C to use the Recovery Console. The Recovery
Console then prompts you for the administrator password. If you do not have
the correct password, Recovery Console does not allow access to the
computer. If an incorrect password is entered three times, the Recovery
Console quits and restarts the computer. Note If the registry is corrupted
or missing or no valid installations are found, the Recovery Console starts
in the root of the startup volume without requiring a password. You cannot
access any folders, but you can carry out commands such as chkdsk, fixboot,
and fixmbr for limited disk repairs. Once the password has been validated,
you have full access to the Recovery Console, but limited access to the hard
disk. You can only access the following folders on your computer: drive
root, %systemroot% or %windir%

--

Regards,

Dave Patrick ....Please no email replies - reply in newsgroup.
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows]
http://www.microsoft.com/protect

 

[Seth]

run check disk

 

[Colin_D]

run check disk

His best bet is not to try resurrecting the laptop drive at all, in case
it is rendered unreadable, specially by chkdsk.

I would remove the drive from the laptop and run it as an additional
drive in another (desktop) computer, say as drive D, maybe on the
secondary IDE port to save changing the drive to a slave. Some adapter
hardware may be needed to hook it up, though.

If it happens to be a SATA drive, a SATA-capable desktop can run the
drive with no problems.

Then, recover all the needed files from the drive, and write them to a
DVD, presuming the laptop is modern enough to have a DVD drive.

And, absorb the lesson here; backup, backup, backup.

Colin D.