Recovery Console won't start

[Guest]

Ok, here's the full story. Today at about three, high winds caused a moment
when the power fluxuated, causing the house's computers to turn off. However
when my father's rebooted, he got the message:
Windows cannot start because the following is missing or corrupt
/windows/system32/config/system

The screen also suggested the Recovery system, which made perfect sense to
me. I'm not sure where my father's origional Windows Install disk is, but I
knew exactly where my own computer's disk was (Had to install to a new system
drive when my origional was damaged several months ago.)

I loaded the disk into my father's machine, rebooted from the CD, and it
loaded to the blue screen with the Windows Setup header, then nothing.
Initially I suspected that there might be a hardware problem with the 3.5
floppy drive (Which has been on the fritz for years) because the last
apparent thing that happened was the floppy drive briefly spun up. Cutting
the power to the floppy initially seemed to block the setup from reaching the
blue setup screen at all, but replacing the drive with one that worked did
not solve the problem.

So basicly, I need to start a recovery console but I can't get my windows
install disk to boot that far. Does anyone have any ideas on how I can
approach this problem?

 

[Guest]

Ok, here's the full story. Today at about three, high winds caused a moment
when the power fluxuated, causing the house's computers to turn off. However
when my father's rebooted, he got the message:
Windows cannot start because the following is missing or corrupt
/windows/system32/config/system

The screen also suggested the Recovery system, which made perfect sense to
me. I'm not sure where my father's origional Windows Install disk is, but I
knew exactly where my own computer's disk was (Had to install to a new system
drive when my origional was damaged several months ago.)

I loaded the disk into my father's machine, rebooted from the CD, and it
loaded to the blue screen with the Windows Setup header, then nothing.
Initially I suspected that there might be a hardware problem with the 3.5
floppy drive (Which has been on the fritz for years) because the last
apparent thing that happened was the floppy drive briefly spun up. Cutting
the power to the floppy initially seemed to block the setup from reaching the
blue setup screen at all, but replacing the drive with one that worked did
not solve the problem.

Clarification: Double checking with the expected screens, the blue Windows
Setup screen has the Windows Setup at the top, but lacks the grey bar with
"Press F6 if you need to install a third party SCSI or RAID driver...".

 

[Patrick Keenan]

Ok, here's the full story. Today at about three, high winds caused a
moment
when the power fluxuated, causing the house's computers to turn off.
However
when my father's rebooted, he got the message:
Windows cannot start because the following is missing or corrupt
/windows/system32/config/system

The screen also suggested the Recovery system, which made perfect sense to
me. I'm not sure where my father's origional Windows Install disk is, but
I
knew exactly where my own computer's disk was (Had to install to a new
system
drive when my origional was damaged several months ago.)

I loaded the disk into my father's machine, rebooted from the CD, and it
loaded to the blue screen with the Windows Setup header, then nothing.
Initially I suspected that there might be a hardware problem with the 3.5
floppy drive (Which has been on the fritz for years) because the last
apparent thing that happened was the floppy drive briefly spun up.
Cutting
the power to the floppy initially seemed to block the setup from reaching
the
blue setup screen at all, but replacing the drive with one that worked did
not solve the problem.

So basicly, I need to start a recovery console but I can't get my windows
install disk to boot that far. Does anyone have any ideas on how I can
approach this problem?

It's possible that the damage is to more than the filesystem. If you have
access to another machine, and can temporarily move the drive to it, you can
perform the initial registry repair steps from the other system. As to
the floppy issue, change the boot sequence in the BIOS so that the CD boots
first, then hard disk, then floppy.

HTH
-pk

 

[Guest]

It's possible that the damage is to more than the filesystem. If you have
access to another machine, and can temporarily move the drive to it, you can
perform the initial registry repair steps from the other system. As to
the floppy issue, change the boot sequence in the BIOS so that the CD boots
first, then hard disk, then floppy.

Hmm, Yes that's a definate possibility, Though I have a USB drive enclosure,
is there any utility for doing the repair using that from within windows?

Also, the fact is, my BIOS is set to boot first from the CD, then the two
hard drives, with NO mention of the floppy anywhere.

 

[Patrick Keenan]

Hmm, Yes that's a definate possibility, Though I have a USB drive
enclosure,
is there any utility for doing the repair using that from within windows?

You could do it maually if you could get to Windows, but since the system
won't start without the registry repair, it's hard to achieve - unless
you've hosted the drive on another working Windows machine using the USB
enclosure.

Also, the fact is, my BIOS is set to boot first from the CD, then the two
hard drives, with NO mention of the floppy anywhere.

The floppy may have failed, been disconnected, or simply been turned off or
not specified in the boot sequence- it isn't required.

HTH
-pk