Help Needed Fast - Parents Business PC DEAD

[ChristopherP]

Hello.

Got a problem here for y'all to help solve if poss please

It's not with my computer, but with my parents computer (with all VERY important company files on)

This morning, i was woken up to "Christopher, the computer had a virus and now it keeps crashing" or something like that, can't exactly remember because i was half asleep, was only 11am.

I got the following email from Dad:

We've had a virus on our PC. Although Norton has caught it, every time the PC boots up we get a message sayin the file:

WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\CONFIG\SYSTEM is missing or corrupt.

Can't find an XP CD, so can you sort it out please. Ta.

Thought oh this would be easy. Popped an XP disk in, looked for the file but couldnt find it, found it on my hdd so i thought i would try and copy that over, but windows wouldn't let me. Interesting.

So i go and see the PC in question. It boots up into windows about every 1 in 3 times you turn it on/restart it. Otherwise it just hangs on the XP boot sequence.

When in windows, you get about 2 minutes use (5 MAX) and then everything stops dead and the mouse freezes, as does anything that was happening on screen.

I managed to get all company documents and emails onto the network, just. Took about 5 or 6 restarts because it kept crashing, one lot of files at a time before it would crash...etc.

It dosent crash on any particular task which is what confuses me - if a particular file was missing or corrupt, the computer would surely only crash when it needed the corrupt file, right? Not here. just random crashes.

If i didn't know about the virus thingy, i'd say it was a hardware failure...

So i go to format it.

Get into windows setup bla bla bla then i choose format in NTFS slow, it gets to...0%... and hangs. Hmm.

I try it again. It gets to... 8% and hangs. Just stops. Hard drive not even going. Seems a bit weird i thought.

And then i give up and come here to see if anyone can help.

Help is VERY VERY much appreciated by both myself and the rents, they need this PC up and running as they need access to all their company docs and emails.

Oh, and i checked the voltages in Abit EQ and they aren't far off what they should be. BIOS settings all correct too.

The spec:

Abit IC7-G
P4 Northy 2.8GHz
512Mb (2x256) GeIL Value DDR400
80Gb Samsung Spinpoint SATA HDD
Power Color 9600XT
Generic 430w PSU

Thanks All.

Chris

 

[psd99]

Hello.


This morning, i was woken up to "Christopher, the computer had a virus and now it keeps crashing" or something like that, can't exactly remember because i was half asleep, was only 11am.

u lazy bugger!!! 11am?

well my mate at his flat had a problem of the same description, as in he would get to windows and it would just FREEZE and hang onm the windows screen.

we worked it out that he had the ms blaster worm virus. he would log into windows and after 2 mins the whole pc would freeze and he coulndt access anything. so the easiest andn foolish way out was to just reformat and reinstall that worked fine in that instance

in your case i see that this isnt the way to do it.

 

[psd99]

rite read it again

from what uve told me im pointing my finger at the harddrive itself

do u hear any weird clicking or abnormal sounds coming from it?
and also have u opened the pc up and possibly changed the ide cable or take it out and renter it?
cuz this may help u reformat it!

try this and then go to windows setup again from what u said it appears u tried reformatting it only once try it again.

 

[Quadophile]

Chris,

You have not mentioned a few things that I was hoping you would do in such circumstances.

Did you try any of the following?


1) System Restore
2) Update MBR
3) Checking for A Virus in Safe Mode

Is SP2 installed on that machine and updated?

 

[psd99]

Thought oh this would be easy. Popped an XP disk in, looked for the file but couldnt find it, found it on my hdd so i thought i would try and copy that over, but windows wouldn't let me. Interesting.

if u mean u found that file on a different installation of windows xp, copying it over direct from my experience wont work.
i remeber my mate trying to copy over his installation of xp over onto a new harddrive but i told him he would be wasting his time!

did he listen to me? no, none does! so he learnt the hardway and i put him out of his misery and gave him my Norton Ghost- what a beautiful peice of software! thank you god!

 

[floppybootstomp]

I'd guess it's either a virus or the hard drive's faulty. Outside chance it's a faulty cable. Extreme outside chance it's a motherboard problem.

What you need to do is format the drive independently of Win XP setup. Do you have any software that can do that? Maybe you could even format it to FAT32 using a Win 98 boot disk. What you do want to do is wipe the drive, it can always be formatted back to NTFS during the Win XP install.

Also worth checking the Bios to see if it has a low level format capability.

 

[ChristopherP]

Thanks for all the replies guys

1) System Restore
2) Update MBR
3) Checking for A Virus in Safe Mode

Is SP2 installed on that machine and updated?

1. Nope - but is SR not for driver issues - rolls back drivers to the last working state right? No drivers been installed recently...

2. MBR - isn't that the Master Boot Record? It can boot into windows fine...sometimes...

3. The virus was picked up and quarantined immediatly by norton as it came with an email aparently, so i'm not sure if that would help...

Please tell me if i'm wrong!!

opened the pc up and possibly changed the ide cable or take it out and renter it?

The Hard Drive uses the SATA interface, and the computer hasn't been moved, or opened up for months on end, so i don't see how the cable could have come loose. The drive is also being detected fine, which suggests the connection is dandy, i think.

But yes i did open it up to check all fans were working, which they were, as i thought maybe the northbridge fan had fallen off or the PSU fan died or something similar.

do u hear any weird clicking or abnormal sounds coming from it?

Nope.

What you need to do is format the drive independently of Win XP setup. Do you have any software that can do that? Maybe you could even format it to FAT32 using a Win 98 boot disk. What you do want to do is wipe the drive, it can always be formatted back to NTFS during the Win XP install.

umm nope, i don't think i do have any programs like that?

What would be different about using XP setup? It's booted from the CD so it's totally independant of the installed version right?

I could try the 98 disk way, but i have no clue how, and doubt i even have a 98 boot disk, all computers in house are now on XP. Unless we have one laying around from the old Dell machine. I'll ask dad if needs be.

Also worth checking the Bios to see if it has a low level format capability.

I haven't noticed anything like this in there, its the same motherboard as i have, and im in my BIOS all the time tweaking stuff...

---------

Thanks for all the help guys, hope this all helps.

Chris

 

[floppybootstomp]

What would be different about using XP setup? It's booted from the CD so it's totally independant of the installed version right?

You're probably right. I just had this weird notion that the virus was that clever it saw an install coming and put the kybosh on it. You know, from the hard drive during an attempted install.

On second thoughts, that's unlikely, isn't it?

But it would still make me feel better to try a fresh install to a clean disk. Illogical I know, but that's just me

 

[ChristopherP]

Well i'm willing to try anything that could make it work!!

Is there anyway i can do this then without the XP disc?

 

[Ian]

It sounds like a Hard Drive problem to me too... try running a full scandisk from a bootdisk - you may have some bad sectors?

The virus could be a big co-incidence, or a nasty one.

 

[ChristopherP]

I have never run anything from a bootdisk before, so if you could run me through it i would appreciate that very much.

cheers

 

[ChristopherP]

Oh and i did try running Scandisk, in windows, but..... It crashed.

 

[Ian]

I have never run anything from a bootdisk before, so if you could run me through it i would appreciate that very much.

cheers

I haven't made one in Windows XP before, so I'm not sure how to go about it - I've still got one from Windows 98 that I use. Someone here will remember how to make one with XP

Basically, you make the boot disk, copy the dos scandisk over to it (possibly chkdsk in WinXP) and run this from the DOS prompt. Make sure it does the full scan as you'll need to check for bad sectors.

 

[Quadophile]

From all the posts, it now appears that the drive is on its way out. If you recall I lost my boot drive sometime back and it was also very erratic. When I checked it through the makers software it reported problems surely. That is when I replaced it with a new one. If you can download that smal program from the drive maker you will get to know for sure. That should be tried first before anything else.

 

[floppybootstomp]

From all the posts, it now appears that the drive is on its way out. If you recall I lost my boot drive sometime back and it was also very erratic. When I checked it through the makers software it reported problems surely. That is when I replaced it with a new one. If you can download that smal program from the drive maker you will get to know for sure. That should be tried first before anything else.

I think Quad's on the right track here.

Download the disk manufacturer's analytical software, make the disk, run the test.

 

[ChristopherP]

OOps i was wrong.

It IS SMART and there IS a diagnostic.

Downloading now.

 

[ChristopherP]

Argh.

Good job i just managed to back all the data up, and good job we have spare computers!

I'll run the diagnostic now.

 

[Quadophile]

OOps i was wrong.

It IS SMART and there IS a diagnostic.

Downloading now.

Chris,

You bugger, you said it is not SMART now you say it is!

OK so get on with it and let us know your findings.

 

[ChristopherP]

****.

It froze on 0% on the file structure test of a dos diagnostic program (Ontrack Dataadvisor)

Running again

 

[Shorty]

WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\CONFIG\SYSTEM is missing or corrupt.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307545 would have solved that problem.