Boot Windows with Generic Drivers

[peridian]

Hello,

Thanks to the wonder of NVidia, I've managed to render my WinXP Pro SP2
installation useless.

I needed to roll back my Forceware drivers, so I went through the uninstall
process to remove them. I was presented with two options: 'Uninstall all
drivers excluding display drivers' and 'Uninstall all drivers including
display drivers'

Since its the display drivers I need to roll back, I didn't see much choice.

I have now found that my motherboard is an NVidia nForce4, and that by
uninstalling 'all drivers' I have rendered every port on the back of the
motherboard unusable. So now, my mouse and keyboard do not work.

I have tried both USB and PS/2 ports, neither work. Windows boots up as
normal, and then tries to Add New Hardware, which is always the display
adapter first (hence why if the PS/2 port is working, it does not install the
mouse drivers for it).

Safe Mode does not work either (in any of the options), and the Last Known
Good Configuration option just takes me to the same state.

I'm fast running out of options. I don't know if the Recovery Console
option when booting off the XP disk can help, and I don't want to have to
reinstall the OS.

Now fortunately, my machine is dual boot, and has Vista as a secondary OS.
What I would like to know is if there is anyway I can manually adjust the
files/registry settings in the WinXP install through the file system while I
am in Vista?

I've got the WinXP Forceware installer cache still unpacked on the hard
disk, so I should have all the NVidia driver files. Failing that, can I use
any generic drivers somehow, or force Windows to boot using only generic
drivers?

Any help on this is greatly appreciated.

Regards,
Rob.

 

[GreenieLeBrun]

Hello,

Thanks to the wonder of NVidia, I've managed to render my WinXP Pro
SP2 installation useless.

I needed to roll back my Forceware drivers, so I went through the
uninstall process to remove them. I was presented with two options:
'Uninstall all drivers excluding display drivers' and 'Uninstall all
drivers including display drivers'

Since its the display drivers I need to roll back, I didn't see much
choice.

I have now found that my motherboard is an NVidia nForce4, and that by
uninstalling 'all drivers' I have rendered every port on the back of
the motherboard unusable. So now, my mouse and keyboard do not work.

I have tried both USB and PS/2 ports, neither work. Windows boots up
as normal, and then tries to Add New Hardware, which is always the
display adapter first (hence why if the PS/2 port is working, it does
not install the mouse drivers for it).

Safe Mode does not work either (in any of the options), and the Last
Known Good Configuration option just takes me to the same state.

I'm fast running out of options. I don't know if the Recovery Console
option when booting off the XP disk can help, and I don't want to
have to reinstall the OS.

Now fortunately, my machine is dual boot, and has Vista as a
secondary OS. What I would like to know is if there is anyway I can
manually adjust the files/registry settings in the WinXP install
through the file system while I am in Vista?

I've got the WinXP Forceware installer cache still unpacked on the
hard disk, so I should have all the NVidia driver files. Failing
that, can I use any generic drivers somehow, or force Windows to boot
using only generic drivers?

Any help on this is greatly appreciated.

Regards,
Rob.

Have you considered doing a repair install?

How to perform an in-place upgrade (reinstallation) of Windows
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;315341

How to Perform a Windows XP Repair Install
http://michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

 

[DL]

If you have a winxp cd of the same sp level as installed on your sys run a
winxp repair install and either install mobo drivers from the mobo cd, or
those that you have downloaded from mobo site
If your winxp cd is the wrong sp level, create a slipstreamed install cd
that contains latest sp
PS you can roll back drivers within Hardware Devices, under system in
control panel