Fresh Install

[paul bewsey]

Dear All,
I hope somebody can help...i bought myself a new hard drive 500gb sat
2 and i have Vista Home Basic..I tried to do a fresh install of Window
on the new drive and the windows seems to load ok until it gets to th
end of installation and my machine just restarts over and over and won
load windows..just before it restarts everytime you can just see th
"blue screen of death" for a second before it restarts...any clues?
Also i tried to do a fresh install over my old hard drive and that won
work either..after it says loading windows files..i get the blue scree
agai

 

[Saucy]

Dear All,
I hope somebody can help...i bought myself a new hard drive 500gb sata
2 and i have Vista Home Basic..I tried to do a fresh install of Windows
on the new drive and the windows seems to load ok until it gets to the
end of installation and my machine just restarts over and over and wont
load windows..just before it restarts everytime you can just see the
"blue screen of death" for a second before it restarts...any clues?
Also i tried to do a fresh install over my old hard drive and that wont
work either..after it says loading windows files..i get the blue screen
again

First off what is the stop error on the blue screen?

Otherwise:

There are probably several possible causes. The last time Windows failed to
install for me was because the computer it was installing on was slightly
overclocked and that didn't mesh well with its new video card. Setting the
computer's BIOS back to the facotry defaults solved the problem.

You can also check to see if all RAM and PCI cards are properly and firmly
seated, that cables are solidly plugged in and that there is an adequate
power supply for the computer.

You can also use the Windows disc to do a check of the RAM. When booting and
the Windows disc boots to its screen, there should be an option for Repair.
Click that instead of "Install". Then use the tools to check the integrity
of the computer's memory.

Yup, and so on ..

Saucy

 

[Spikey]

Start menu - Settings - Control panel - System - Advance tab - under system
failure - untick "Automatically restart" - OK.

Then when it goes to blue screen it wont restart so you can read the
message. Post it back to the forum. I'm guessing it will be moaning about
drivers??

Is this a new machine, or new OS on a computer that previously had another
OS and you are still using the existing motherboard, in which case you may
need to update the bios and firmware to match the new OS first. The
motherboard manufacturers site will usually have these for download assuming
its compatible for vista.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

This would work if the OP could boot to Windows...

Here's what I did once: I set up my camcorder pointing at the screen of the
computer, started the camera, then Windows. Then I waited for the crash.

It was not easy to read the screen on the video, but it *was* possible

BTW, I didn't have the OP's problem of *instant* restart, but at the time I
didn't know about your (excellent) suggestion to prevent instant
restarting.

Question: are there logs that might help, if you tried to read the drive in
another computer? You'd have to know where to find the logs. (This is not
an easy solution...)

 

[Spikey]

As he has seen the BSOD I assume it is actually booting to windows but
crashing so quickly its not visible??

Before I was better imformed I remember sitting with a note pad, and writing
a few words as the screen flashed before my eyes, gradually building up the
message as each restart happened. I never did get the full message. Some
kind soul here put me out of my misery and told me where to switch off the
restart.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

As he has seen the BSOD I assume it is actually booting to windows but
crashing so quickly its not visible??

Before I was better imformed I remember sitting with a note pad, and writing
a few words as the screen flashed before my eyes, gradually building up the
message as each restart happened. I never did get the full message. Some
kind soul here put me out of my misery and told me where to switch off the
restart.

Been there, done that ... and *hated* it

That's why I did the camcorder thing...before I found out about the auto
restart checkbox.

I definitely get the feeling the OP can't get into Windows long enough to
make the change you suggested to the restart. It is the best (only!) way to
do it, and I try to remember to make that change as soon as I start running
a new or restored OS - before I need it, before I get trapped like the OP.

One might ask: why the hell is the other setting the default?

Is there a way to make the change from outside? Hook the drive to another
computer and edit the boot.ini? Anything?

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Been there, done that ... and *hated* it

That's why I did the camcorder thing...before I found out about the auto
restart checkbox.

I definitely get the feeling the OP can't get into Windows long enough to
make the change you suggested to the restart. It is the best (only!) way to
do it, and I try to remember to make that change as soon as I start running
a new or restored OS - before I need it, before I get trapped like the OP.

One might ask: why the hell is the other setting the default?

Is there a way to make the change from outside? Hook the drive to another
computer and edit the boot.ini? Anything?

The registry entry that controls the rebooting is here:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl]
"AutoReboot"=dword:00000001

One way to alter it outside of Vista would be to boot from a BartPE type of boot disc that had
a registry editor included.
(If 'Autoreboot' is deleted Vista just re-writes it with a value of 1 as default).
You can also use the command 'reg add' from an elevated prompt:

reg add hklm\currentcontrolset\control\crashcontrol /v autoreboot /t reg_dword /d 0 /f

(reg /? and reg add /? for details on the command)

I can't get it to work from the command prompt on the Vista repair disk for some reason.
It says 'operation completed successfully' but the reboot box remains checked on the dialog box.

Thanks for the info.

I should probably make a BartPE...

As of a few minutes ago, I do have a Vista Recovery Disk from vistax64.com.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

> > > >
On Thu, 19 Feb 2009 02:31:07 -0000, Spikey wrote:


Been there, done that ... and *hated* it

That's why I did the camcorder thing...before I found out about the
auto
restart checkbox.

I definitely get the feeling the OP can't get into Windows long
enough to
make the change you suggested to the restart. It is the best (only!)
way to
do it, and I try to remember to make that change as soon as I start
running
a new or restored OS - before I need it, before I get trapped like
the OP.

One might ask: why the hell is the other setting the default?

Is there a way to make the change from outside? Hook the drive to
another
computer and edit the boot.ini? Anything?

The registry entry that controls the rebooting is here:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl]
"AutoReboot"=dword:00000001

One way to alter it outside of Vista would be to boot from a
BartPE type of boot disc that had
a registry editor included.
(If 'Autoreboot' is deleted Vista just re-writes it with a value
of 1 as default).
You can also use the command 'reg add' from an elevated prompt:

reg add hklm\currentcontrolset\control\crashcontrol /v autoreboot
/t reg_dword /d 0 /f

(reg /? and reg add /? for details on the command)

I can't get it to work from the command prompt on the Vista
repair disk for some reason.
It says 'operation completed successfully' but the reboot box
remains checked on the dialog box. > > Thanks for the info.

I should probably make a BartPE...

As of a few minutes ago, I do have a Vista Recovery Disk from
vistax64.com.

Hello Gene,

This might be of interest - free bootable registry editor

'PC Regedit, Create, delete and edit Windows registry key-values
without Windows.' (http://www.pcregedit.com/)

Hope it helps

SIW2

It *is* of interest (although I'm not the OP with the problem). It's
downloading as we speak

Thanks...