BSOD recovery

M

MikeR

One of my machines came up this morning with a BSOD. The message is:
"The registry cannot load the hive(file):
\SystemRoot\System32\config\Software or its log or alternate"
It is corrupted, absent, or not writable."

Then it does a dump of physical memory to the disk.

Re-booting into safe mode gives the same result, as does returning to the last known
good configuration.

How can I recover from this? Repair installation? New HD, and copy off what data I
can (provided the disk is readable)?
Thanks,
Mike
 
P

Patrick Keenan

MikeR said:
One of my machines came up this morning with a BSOD. The message is:
"The registry cannot load the hive(file):
\SystemRoot\System32\config\Software or its log or alternate"
It is corrupted, absent, or not writable."

Then it does a dump of physical memory to the disk.

Re-booting into safe mode gives the same result, as does returning to the
last known good configuration.

How can I recover from this? Repair installation? New HD, and copy off
what data I can (provided the disk is readable)?
Thanks,
Mike

Clearly, the registry is damaged, and you may find that the method described
here helps restart the machine:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307545

HTH
-pk
 
N

Nepatsfan

MikeR said:
One of my machines came up this morning with a BSOD. The message is:
"The registry cannot load the hive(file):
\SystemRoot\System32\config\Software or its log or alternate"
It is corrupted, absent, or not writable."

Then it does a dump of physical memory to the disk.

Re-booting into safe mode gives the same result, as does returning to the last
known good configuration.

How can I recover from this? Repair installation? New HD, and copy off what
data I can (provided the disk is readable)?
Thanks,
Mike

If your computer came with an actual XP installation CD, you can try the
procedure outlined in this article.

How to recover from a corrupted registry that prevents Windows XP from starting
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;q307545

I'd suggest making recovery of any important files that you haven't backed up a
priority before attempting any sort of repair procedure.

Good luck

Nepatsfan
 
M

MikeR

Thanks both for the links.

I am in the recovery console, and have created the tmp directory, but I cannot copy
the hives? to it. "The file could not be copied."
 
M

MikeR

I am in the recovery console, and have created the tmp directory, but I
cannot copy the hives? to it. "The file could not be copied."
After this, for some reason I was able to go back to the last known good
configuration. I ran chkdsk /r, and no errors or bad sectors.

A new user was created with a user name of mike.computername. E-mail(OE) settings and
boxes are gone. Can I recover those? Or change to user mike? There's no choice on the
logoff menu.
 
P

Patrick Keenan

MikeR said:
After this, for some reason I was able to go back to the last known good
configuration. I ran chkdsk /r, and no errors or bad sectors.

A new user was created with a user name of mike.computername. E-mail(OE)
settings and boxes are gone. Can I recover those? Or change to user mike?
There's no choice on the logoff menu.

Probably not, that profile is likely hopelessly corrupt. Fortunately the
email settings are not difficult to re-enter, and the old message stores are
likely usable and can be imported (import from store folder).

HTH
-pk
 
M

MikeR

Patrick said:
Probably not, that profile is likely hopelessly corrupt. Fortunately the
email settings are not difficult to re-enter, and the old message stores are
likely usable and can be imported (import from store folder).
Thanks, Patrick -
When I open OE I get "There was a problem switching folders, possibly because the
folder was busy. Please wait a moment and try again"

No joy importing old messages. I can go there, but I'm told "No messages can be found
in this folder or another application is running that has the required files open".

The recycle bin has several copies of various mail folders, but restoring them soes
nothing. When I look in the folder it looks empty. I have Explorer set to show hidden
files/folders and system files.

There are other woes as well. IE doesn't show the Help icon, rather arrows indicating
more options off screen, but clicking doesn't open any thing. I can't tell what
version of IE I'm running, but the current Google searchbar won't install.

I can't get Windows to updates because IE is blocking ActiveX's, but when I click on
the toolbar to change options, nothing happens.

Windows help doesn't run.
 
N

Nepatsfan

MikeR said:
After this, for some reason I was able to go back to the last known good
configuration. I ran chkdsk /r, and no errors or bad sectors.

A new user was created with a user name of mike.computername. E-mail(OE)
settings and boxes are gone. Can I recover those? Or change to user mike?
There's no choice on the logoff menu.


Glad to hear you were able to get XP running using LKGC.

As for logging in to your old user account, if it's not listed on the Welcome
screen, it may be corrupted. You can try hitting Ctrl + Alt + Del twice at the
Welcome screen to bring up the Logon to Windows dialog. Enter your old user name
and password and see if it will log you on.

To recover your old files and folders, take a look at this article.

How to copy data from a corrupted user profile to a new profile in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/811151

You'll need to use a third account that's a computer administrator to complete
this procedure. You can create a temporary admin account and delete it when
done.

You'll have to recreate your email accounts. To recover your OE messages and
contacts, search for a folder with .dbx files and a .wab file. They can be
imported into your new account. If you run into problems, you might want to post
your question in the Outlook Express newsgroup,

microsoft.public.windows.inetexplorer.ie6_outlookexpress

Good luck

Nepatsfan
 
M

MikeR

Nepatsfan said:
Glad to hear you were able to get XP running using LKGC.

As for logging in to your old user account, if it's not listed on the Welcome
screen, it may be corrupted. You can try hitting Ctrl + Alt + Del twice at the
Welcome screen to bring up the Logon to Windows dialog. Enter your old user name
and password and see if it will log you on.

To recover your old files and folders, take a look at this article.

How to copy data from a corrupted user profile to a new profile in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/811151

You'll need to use a third account that's a computer administrator to complete
this procedure. You can create a temporary admin account and delete it when
done.

You'll have to recreate your email accounts. To recover your OE messages and
contacts, search for a folder with .dbx files and a .wab file. They can be
imported into your new account. If you run into problems, you might want to post
your question in the Outlook Express newsgroup,

microsoft.public.windows.inetexplorer.ie6_outlookexpress

Thanks Nepatsfan -
I'll give all that a go. The system is not well tho, so there's other work to do.

Mike (Jagsfan)
 
P

Patrick Keenan

MikeR said:
Thanks, Patrick -
When I open OE I get "There was a problem switching folders, possibly
because the folder was busy. Please wait a moment and try again"

No joy importing old messages. I can go there, but I'm told "No messages
can be found in this folder or another application is running that has the
required files open".

Make sure you've actually found the store folder and that the contents are
not read-only. I usually use Agent Ransack from the root of the drive or
the base of the Docs and Settings folder to be sure I've found all of them,
searching for *.dbx.

http://www.mythicsoft.com/agentransack/

When you have found the folders, copy the folders with contents complete,
somewhere else. In this case, you might want to copy them to CD or DVD as
well for safety. You may be unable to import them from the CD or DVD as
read-only.

Once you have copied the entire message store folder somewhere else, import
the messages from there. Be sure that the folder and all files are marked
as read-write.

The recycle bin has several copies of various mail folders, but restoring
them soes nothing. When I look in the folder it looks empty. I have
Explorer set to show hidden files/folders and system files.

There are other woes as well. IE doesn't show the Help icon, rather arrows
indicating more options off screen, but clicking doesn't open any thing. I
can't tell what version of IE I'm running, but the current Google
searchbar won't install.

I can't get Windows to updates because IE is blocking ActiveX's, but when
I click on the toolbar to change options, nothing happens.

Windows help doesn't run.

When I see this kind of thing I start to evaluate the value of the time it's
going to take to fix it against the cost of another drive and a clean fresh
install. Where I am, a new 250 gig drive is under $100, 500gig just
over. And I can do a complete installation of Windows and major apps in a
few hours, most of which is letting the system run by itself and coming back
to click the mouse, change CDs or enter a key once in a while. I direct
most of my attention elsewhere during this exercise.

The original drive is removed, set aside, and treated as a backup source.
User data is copied from it later after the system is running properly (I
use FileSync, http://www.fileware.com/ to move the data). The result is
a properly running system and fewer hours billed.

The alternative is spending possibly much more time completely focused on
tracking down obscure problems, and likely a much higher bill that has a
caveat that the problems may not have all been found. And since you're
using the same disk, you have to have backed it up first, which requires
another disk anyway, and more time.

HTH
-pk
 
M

MikeR

Nepatsfan said:
As for logging in to your old user account, if it's not listed on the Welcome
screen, it may be corrupted. You can try hitting Ctrl + Alt + Del twice at the
Welcome screen to bring up the Logon to Windows dialog. Enter your old user name
and password and see if it will log you on.
Brings up Task Manager. Is that what it's supposed to do? No one is listed in the
users pane.
To recover your old files and folders, take a look at this article.

How to copy data from a corrupted user profile to a new profile in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/811151

You'll need to use a third account that's a computer administrator to complete
this procedure. You can create a temporary admin account and delete it when
done.
Can't create a new user. In Control Panel clicking Users does nothing. The only place
I can see anything close to a user is under Docs & Settings, and in Local Users &
Groups in Computer Management.
You'll have to recreate your email accounts. To recover your OE messages and
contacts, search for a folder with .dbx files and a .wab file. They can be
imported into your new account. If you run into problems, you might want to post
your question in the Outlook Express newsgroup,
Got the mailboxes and address book back, and set up OE again.
Thanks a ton for your tips.
 
N

Nepatsfan

MikeR said:
Brings up Task Manager. Is that what it's supposed to do? No one is listed in
the users pane.


You need to log off from your current account, Start -> Log off. This should
take you to the Welcome screen. Once there, hit Ctrl + Alt + Del twice to bring
up the Logon to Windows dialog. Enter the user name and password of your old
account and see if you can logon.


Can't create a new user. In Control Panel clicking Users does nothing. The
only place I can see anything close to a user is under Docs & Settings, and in
Local Users & Groups in Computer Management.


Not being able to launch the User Accounts applet in Control Panel isn't a good
sign. Locate the following file and see if it launches User Accounts.

C:\WINDOWS\system32\nusrmgr.cpl

If that doesn't work, you can create a new user account in the Local Users and
Groups console by double clicking the Users folder, right clicking an open spot
in the right hand pane, and selecting "New user" from the menu. You would then
have to make the account a member of the Administrators group.

Getting back to the problem with Control Panel, if you find additional problems
you might consider running System Restore to take your computer back to a time
before the BSOD happened. If that still doesn't fix the problem you may have to
run a repair installation of XP.

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

Microsoft's Windows XP Professional (Pro) Repair Install step by step
http://www.windowsxpprofessional.windowsreinstall.com/installxpcdrepair/indexfullpage.htm


Got the mailboxes and address book back, and set up OE again.


Glad to hear you were able to recover your email and addresses.

Thanks a ton for your tips.

You're welcome.

Nepatsfan
 
M

MikeR

Patrick said:
Make sure you've actually found the store folder and that the contents are
not read-only. I usually use Agent Ransack from the root of the drive or
the base of the Docs and Settings folder to be sure I've found all of them,
searching for *.dbx.

Found and imported. They only showed up when I did a search, not by looking with
Windows Explorer. Copied to a temp location, and imported from there.
When I see this kind of thing I start to evaluate the value of the time it's
going to take to fix it against the cost of another drive and a clean fresh
install. Where I am, a new 250 gig drive is under $100, 500gig just
over. And I can do a complete installation of Windows and major apps in a
few hours, most of which is letting the system run by itself and coming back
to click the mouse, change CDs or enter a key once in a while. I direct
most of my attention elsewhere during this exercise.
I think this is the way to go. The more I tinker with it the more problems I uncover.
Thanks, Patrick, for all your time and thought.
 
M

MikeR

Nepatsfan said:
You need to log off from your current account, Start -> Log off. This should
take you to the Welcome screen. Once there, hit Ctrl + Alt + Del twice to bring
up the Logon to Windows dialog. Enter the user name and password of your old
account and see if you can logon. No joy.

Not being able to launch the User Accounts applet in Control Panel isn't a good
sign. Locate the following file and see if it launches User Accounts.

C:\WINDOWS\system32\nusrmgr.cpl Nope.

If that doesn't work, you can create a new user account in the Local Users and
Groups console by double clicking the Users folder, right clicking an open spot
in the right hand pane, and selecting "New user" from the menu. You would then
have to make the account a member of the Administrators group. Yes.

Getting back to the problem with Control Panel, if you find additional problems
you might consider running System Restore to take your computer back to a time
before the BSOD happened. If that still doesn't fix the problem you may have to
run a repair installation of XP.

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

Microsoft's Windows XP Professional (Pro) Repair Install step by step
http://www.windowsxpprofessional.windowsreinstall.com/installxpcdrepair/indexfullpage.htm
The more I tinker wit this, the more hairy spiders I discover. There's not a lot of
stuff on this box. I think I'll copy off what I can, and do a fresh install of XP.
Now if I can find my SP2 disk.....

Again, thanks for all your time and thought to get me this far.
 
N

Nepatsfan

MikeR said:
The more I tinker wit this, the more hairy spiders I discover. There's not a
lot of stuff on this box. I think I'll copy off what I can, and do a fresh
install of XP. Now if I can find my SP2 disk.....

Again, thanks for all your time and thought to get me this far.


You're welcome. Good luck with the reinstall.

Nepatsfan
 

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