How to clone Windows XP back to your HD?

[Carl]

Carl, I am so sorry to hear of your continued problems.

However, I am truly heartened by your tenacity in getting the USB Recovery Console
fully working for yourself.

One thing - because you logged on to C:\WINDOWS you know your XP partition is still
there, along with all your personal data!

The next thing I would have advised, would be to start-up your PC with a Win98 floppy
boot-disk.  I would then have instructed you to type the command FDISK - which would
list any partitions that still exist on the boot device.  If the XP partition still
existed you could make it bootable.

But,  as we are talking about a Netbook, this won't be possible.

BTW - You are getting "GRUB loading" because the boot-sector (a small hidden section
at the start of each partition) has been taken over by a Linux loading program
written on to it, in place of the Windows boot-sector loading "program"which
searches for NTLDR on C:\

The only thing I can then advise is to again, start up the PC with the bootable USB
drive, then type *both* commands - one after another - without [re]booting
in-between.

FIXMBR C:
FIXBOOT C:

...then reboot.  This has worked for me in the past.  And, if stillno joy, reverse
the order of the commands.

I do feel quite confident that we will get there in the end...

Cheers,    Tim Meddick,    Peckham, London.    

Tim -

Many thanks for your patience and perservance on this problem.

I am away from my Netbook, visiting family in South Carolina for a few
days, but will follow your instructins when I return home, early next
week.

I'll report on the results.

Carl.

Hi Tim -

Back home. Started the netbook with the Windows Recovery flash drive.

At the prompt > typed FIXMBR C; and hit Enter
No text appeared, it simply brought me back to the prompt > and I
entered FIXBOOT C:
It returned, roughly;
Target partition is C:
Sure you want to write a new bootsector to the partition? Entered Y
It returned, File system is NTFS, FIXBOOT writing a new bootsector,
then, Successfully written.

At the prompt, I typed Exit and the netbook restarted and since the
flash drive was still in, it booted up from it.

I shut down by holding down the on/off button and when it restarted, I
was back to
RUB loading.
error: no such partition
grub rescue>

I then reversed the order of the commands: FIXBOOT C first, FIXMBR
second.
Again, FIXBOOT successfully wrote a new bootsector and FIXMBR did not
return any message.
Typed EXIT, held down the f2 key, reordered the boot order putting the
Samsung IDE HDD first, and exited saving that configuration.
Again got
GRUB loading.
error: no such partition
grub rescue>


I wrote in this much detail as the thought occurred that perhaps I was
doing something wrong AFTER running the FIXMBR and FIXBOOT commands.

Am I?

As usual, many thanks.

Carl

 

[Tim Meddick]

No, you did it correctly.

I don't understand it...

Admittedly, I am a little "hazy" on which command does what, but having executed both
and in both and reverse order, *one* or other of the commands should have :

FIXBOOT
Re-written the bootsector - the beginning sector (sector 0) of a partition.

FIXMBR
Re-written the Master Boot Record (MBR) - the beginning sector of a hard-drive
(sector 0) which contains the partition table and the loading code of the active O.S.

....so would have thought that this last command would have over-written the LINUX
"Grub" loading code!!!???

If we were dealing with a PC and not a NetBook - I would have suggested starting with
an M$-DOS bootdisk (floppy) and executing the program FDISK.EXE (same argument with
using a PEbuild boot cd)

With which you could have inspected the layout of partitions and made WINDOWS the
*active* partition.

The equivalent in the Recovery Console is the command : DISKPART

Unfortunately, you can't make partitions "active" with this - only ADD or DELETE
them.

Typing : DISKPART will probably only confirm what I believe has happened here.

1. You deleted the UBUNTU partition.

2. The WINDOWS partition still exists intact.

3. The MBR written with the "Grub" loading-code stubbornly refuses to be repaired
with the FIXMBR / FIXBOOT commands.


BTW - I think I remember now the order I used the commands :

FIXMBR
FIXBOOT C:

However, the DISKPART command may reveal some useful information.

If you do use it, copy the resultant partition information down and post it here.


==

Cheers, Tim Meddick, Peckham, London.

Carl, I am so sorry to hear of your continued problems.

However, I am truly heartened by your tenacity in getting the USB Recovery
Console
fully working for yourself.

One thing - because you logged on to C:\WINDOWS you know your XP partition is
still
there, along with all your personal data!

The next thing I would have advised, would be to start-up your PC with a Win98
floppy
boot-disk. I would then have instructed you to type the command FDISK - which
would
list any partitions that still exist on the boot device. If the XP partition
still
existed you could make it bootable.

But, as we are talking about a Netbook, this won't be possible.

BTW - You are getting "GRUB loading" because the boot-sector (a small hidden
section
at the start of each partition) has been taken over by a Linux loading program
written on to it, in place of the Windows boot-sector loading "program" which
searches for NTLDR on C:\

The only thing I can then advise is to again, start up the PC with the bootable
USB
drive, then type *both* commands - one after another - without [re]booting
in-between.

FIXMBR C:
FIXBOOT C:

...then reboot. This has worked for me in the past. And, if still no joy, reverse
the order of the commands.

I do feel quite confident that we will get there in the end...

Cheers, Tim Meddick, Peckham, London.

Tim -

Many thanks for your patience and perservance on this problem.

I am away from my Netbook, visiting family in South Carolina for a few
days, but will follow your instructins when I return home, early next
week.

I'll report on the results.

Carl.

Hi Tim -

Back home. Started the netbook with the Windows Recovery flash drive.

At the prompt > typed FIXMBR C; and hit Enter
No text appeared, it simply brought me back to the prompt > and I
entered FIXBOOT C:
It returned, roughly;
Target partition is C:
Sure you want to write a new bootsector to the partition? Entered Y
It returned, File system is NTFS, FIXBOOT writing a new bootsector,
then, Successfully written.

At the prompt, I typed Exit and the netbook restarted and since the
flash drive was still in, it booted up from it.

I shut down by holding down the on/off button and when it restarted, I
was back to
RUB loading.
error: no such partition
grub rescue>

I then reversed the order of the commands: FIXBOOT C first, FIXMBR
second.
Again, FIXBOOT successfully wrote a new bootsector and FIXMBR did not
return any message.
Typed EXIT, held down the f2 key, reordered the boot order putting the
Samsung IDE HDD first, and exited saving that configuration.
Again got
GRUB loading.
error: no such partition
grub rescue>


I wrote in this much detail as the thought occurred that perhaps I was
doing something wrong AFTER running the FIXMBR and FIXBOOT commands.

Am I?

As usual, many thanks.

Carl

 

[John John - MVP]

Hi Tim -

Back home. Started the netbook with the Windows Recovery flash drive.

At the prompt > typed FIXMBR C; and hit Enter
No text appeared, it simply brought me back to the prompt >

You didn't do it right, FIXMBR uses the device name rather than the
drive letter, for example:

fixmbr \device\harddisk0

Note the double "dd" in the device name (hard+disk)

To get a list of devices use the MAP command.

If the syntax is correct you will get a warning message and you will be
prompted to confirm the action. If you answer Y (yes) to confirm the
action you will receive a message stating that a new master boot record
was successfully written. If the syntax is incorrect you will be
returned to the > prompt without any message of any kind.

You can also run the FIXMBR command without specifying any device and
the MBR will be written to the boot device, here again you will receive
a warning message and be asked to confirm the action.

Fixmbr will surely dislodge the GRUB loader from the MBR, you just have
to use the proper syntax.

John

 

[Tim Meddick]

Sorry Carl (& John), I guess I did get that wrong.

I didn't realise that one would not get an error message if the syntax was out.

However, if you read right through the tread - I first stated to issue the commands
separately and did give the correct syntax (initially) :

FIXMBR

then, and / or :

FIXBOOT C:


....and reading the replies, I believe he has done just that!

==

Cheers, Tim Meddick, Peckham, London.

 

[Twayne]

In

Carl, I am so sorry to hear of your continued problems.

However, I am truly heartened by your tenacity in getting
the USB Recovery Console fully working for yourself.

One thing - because you logged on to C:\WINDOWS you know
your XP partition is still there, along with all your
personal data!

The next thing I would have advised, would be to start-up
your PC with a Win98 floppy boot-disk. I would then have
instructed you to type the command FDISK - which would
list any partitions that still exist on the boot device.
If the XP partition still existed you could make it
bootable.

But, as we are talking about a Netbook, this won't be
possible.

BTW - You are getting "GRUB loading" because the
boot-sector (a small hidden section at the start of each
partition) has been taken over by a Linux loading program
written on to it, in place of the Windows boot-sector
loading "program" which searches for NTLDR on C:\

The only thing I can then advise is to again, start up
the PC with the bootable USB drive, then type *both*
commands - one after another - without [re]booting
in-between.

FIXMBR C:
FIXBOOT C:

...then reboot. This has worked for me in the past.
And, if still no joy, reverse the order of the commands.

I do feel quite confident that we will get there in the
end...

Cheers, Tim Meddick, Peckham, London.

Tim -

Many thanks for your patience and perservance on this
problem.

I am away from my Netbook, visiting family in South
Carolina for a few days, but will follow your instructins
when I return home, early next week.

I'll report on the results.

Carl.

Hi Tim -

Back home. Started the netbook with the Windows Recovery
flash drive.

At the prompt > typed FIXMBR C; and hit Enter
No text appeared, it simply brought me back to the prompt >
and I
entered FIXBOOT C:
It returned, roughly;
Target partition is C:
Sure you want to write a new bootsector to the partition?
Entered Y
It returned, File system is NTFS, FIXBOOT writing a new
bootsector,
then, Successfully written.

At the prompt, I typed Exit and the netbook restarted and
since the
flash drive was still in, it booted up from it.

I shut down by holding down the on/off button and when it
restarted, I
was back to
RUB loading.
error: no such partition
grub rescue>

I then reversed the order of the commands: FIXBOOT C
first, FIXMBR
second.
Again, FIXBOOT successfully wrote a new bootsector and
FIXMBR did not
return any message.
Typed EXIT, held down the f2 key, reordered the boot order
putting the
Samsung IDE HDD first, and exited saving that configuration.
Again got
GRUB loading.
error: no such partition
grub rescue>


I wrote in this much detail as the thought occurred that
perhaps I was
doing something wrong AFTER running the FIXMBR and FIXBOOT
commands.

Am I?

As usual, many thanks.

Carl

Carl,

I haven't been following this thread, but here's my 2 ¢ anyway:

You probably need to be doing those things from a bootable CD. Otherwise,
fixMBR etc is going to write an entry for the current operating system which
seems to be Ubuntu? . Same with fixboot/bootfix (I can never remember which
it is). If you wanted it to be writing them for XP, and XP were the
operating system you booted into on the hard drive, then the separate boot
CD wouldn't be necessary.
So, read up on fixmbr and fixboot, get a bootable CD/DVD, and go from
there to be certain. Load windows from your bootable CD/DVD, use the Command
Console and run fixmbr and fixboot that way. Otherwise they won't be writing
data for XP and it'll fail.
I think there are ways to tell fixmbr et al what to write, but I don't
know what they are. Your research might uncover that when you read up on
them.

HTH,

Twayne`

 

[Twayne]

PS re the Subject line: You do not "clone" XP to a drive. A "clone" IS a
hard drive that contains the operating system. What you do is replace a bad
drive with a "cloned" drive, and in theory it will start right up.
Your problem could be in your understanding of what you're trying to
achieve. Whatever it is, it is not "cloning ... back to your HD".

HTH,

Twayne`

In

Carl, I am so sorry to hear of your continued problems.

However, I am truly heartened by your tenacity in getting
the USB Recovery Console fully working for yourself.

One thing - because you logged on to C:\WINDOWS you know
your XP partition is still there, along with all your
personal data!

The next thing I would have advised, would be to start-up
your PC with a Win98 floppy boot-disk. I would then have
instructed you to type the command FDISK - which would
list any partitions that still exist on the boot device.
If the XP partition still existed you could make it
bootable.

But, as we are talking about a Netbook, this won't be
possible.

BTW - You are getting "GRUB loading" because the
boot-sector (a small hidden section at the start of each
partition) has been taken over by a Linux loading program
written on to it, in place of the Windows boot-sector
loading "program" which searches for NTLDR on C:\

The only thing I can then advise is to again, start up
the PC with the bootable USB drive, then type *both*
commands - one after another - without [re]booting
in-between.

FIXMBR C:
FIXBOOT C:

...then reboot. This has worked for me in the past.
And, if still no joy, reverse the order of the commands.

I do feel quite confident that we will get there in the
end...

Cheers, Tim Meddick, Peckham, London.

Tim -

Many thanks for your patience and perservance on this
problem.

I am away from my Netbook, visiting family in South
Carolina for a few days, but will follow your instructins
when I return home, early next week.

I'll report on the results.

Carl.

Hi Tim -

Back home. Started the netbook with the Windows Recovery
flash drive.

At the prompt > typed FIXMBR C; and hit Enter
No text appeared, it simply brought me back to the prompt >
and I
entered FIXBOOT C:
It returned, roughly;
Target partition is C:
Sure you want to write a new bootsector to the partition?
Entered Y
It returned, File system is NTFS, FIXBOOT writing a new
bootsector,
then, Successfully written.

At the prompt, I typed Exit and the netbook restarted and
since the
flash drive was still in, it booted up from it.

I shut down by holding down the on/off button and when it
restarted, I
was back to
RUB loading.
error: no such partition
grub rescue>

I then reversed the order of the commands: FIXBOOT C
first, FIXMBR
second.
Again, FIXBOOT successfully wrote a new bootsector and
FIXMBR did not
return any message.
Typed EXIT, held down the f2 key, reordered the boot order
putting the
Samsung IDE HDD first, and exited saving that configuration.
Again got
GRUB loading.
error: no such partition
grub rescue>


I wrote in this much detail as the thought occurred that
perhaps I was
doing something wrong AFTER running the FIXMBR and FIXBOOT
commands.

Am I?

As usual, many thanks.

Carl

 

[Carl]

No, you did it correctly.

I don't understand it...

Admittedly, I am a little "hazy" on which command does what, but having executed both
and in both and reverse order, *one* or other of the commands should have:

FIXBOOT
Re-written the bootsector - the beginning sector (sector 0) of a partition.

FIXMBR
Re-written the Master Boot Record (MBR) - the beginning sector of a hard-drive
(sector 0) which contains the partition table and the loading code of theactive O.S.

...so would have thought that this last command would have over-written the LINUX
"Grub" loading code!!!???

If we were dealing with a PC and not a NetBook - I would have suggested starting with
an M$-DOS bootdisk (floppy) and executing the program FDISK.EXE (same argument with
using a PEbuild boot cd)

With which you could have inspected the layout of partitions and made WINDOWS the
*active* partition.

The equivalent in the Recovery Console is the command :  DISKPART

Unfortunately, you can't make partitions "active" with this - only  ADD or  DELETE
them.

Typing :  DISKPART  will probably only confirm what I believe has happened here.

1. You deleted the UBUNTU partition.

2. The WINDOWS partition still exists intact.

3. The MBR written with the "Grub" loading-code stubbornly refuses to be repaired
with the FIXMBR / FIXBOOT commands.

BTW - I think I remember now the order I used the commands :

FIXMBR
FIXBOOT C:

However, the DISKPART command may reveal some useful information.

If you do use it, copy the resultant partition information down and post it here.

==

Cheers,    Tim Meddick,    Peckham, London.    


On Apr 24, 9:50 am, Carl <[email protected]> wrote:

 

[Carl]

No, you did it correctly.

I don't understand it...

Admittedly, I am a little "hazy" on which command does what, but having executed both
and in both and reverse order, *one* or other of the commands should have:

FIXBOOT
Re-written the bootsector - the beginning sector (sector 0) of a partition.

FIXMBR
Re-written the Master Boot Record (MBR) - the beginning sector of a hard-drive
(sector 0) which contains the partition table and the loading code of theactive O.S.

...so would have thought that this last command would have over-written the LINUX
"Grub" loading code!!!???

If we were dealing with a PC and not a NetBook - I would have suggested starting with
an M$-DOS bootdisk (floppy) and executing the program FDISK.EXE (same argument with
using a PEbuild boot cd)

With which you could have inspected the layout of partitions and made WINDOWS the
*active* partition.

The equivalent in the Recovery Console is the command :  DISKPART

Unfortunately, you can't make partitions "active" with this - only  ADD or  DELETE
them.

Typing :  DISKPART  will probably only confirm what I believe has happened here.

1. You deleted the UBUNTU partition.

2. The WINDOWS partition still exists intact.

3. The MBR written with the "Grub" loading-code stubbornly refuses to be repaired
with the FIXMBR / FIXBOOT commands.

BTW - I think I remember now the order I used the commands :

FIXMBR
FIXBOOT C:

However, the DISKPART command may reveal some useful information.

If you do use it, copy the resultant partition information down and post it here.

==

Cheers,    Tim Meddick,    Peckham, London.    

Hi Tim -

Ran DISKPART.

Here is what it returned:
152626 MB Disk 0 at Id 0 on atapi [MBR]
-: Partition1 <EISA Utilities> 6150 MB < 3147 MB free>
C: Partition2 <NTFS> 68653 MB < 58942 MB free>
E: Partition3 <NTFS> 39622 MB < 35647 MB free>
Unpartitioned space 38194 MB
957 MB Disk on disk [MPR]

 

[Carl]

No, you did it correctly.

I don't understand it...

Admittedly, I am a little "hazy" on which command does what, but having executed both
and in both and reverse order, *one* or other of the commands should have:

FIXBOOT
Re-written the bootsector - the beginning sector (sector 0) of a partition.

FIXMBR
Re-written the Master Boot Record (MBR) - the beginning sector of a hard-drive
(sector 0) which contains the partition table and the loading code of theactive O.S.

...so would have thought that this last command would have over-written the LINUX
"Grub" loading code!!!???

If we were dealing with a PC and not a NetBook - I would have suggested starting with
an M$-DOS bootdisk (floppy) and executing the program FDISK.EXE (same argument with
using a PEbuild boot cd)

With which you could have inspected the layout of partitions and made WINDOWS the
*active* partition.

The equivalent in the Recovery Console is the command :  DISKPART

Unfortunately, you can't make partitions "active" with this - only  ADD or  DELETE
them.

Typing :  DISKPART  will probably only confirm what I believe has happened here.

1. You deleted the UBUNTU partition.

2. The WINDOWS partition still exists intact.

3. The MBR written with the "Grub" loading-code stubbornly refuses to be repaired
with the FIXMBR / FIXBOOT commands.

BTW - I think I remember now the order I used the commands :

FIXMBR
FIXBOOT C:

However, the DISKPART command may reveal some useful information.

If you do use it, copy the resultant partition information down and post it here.

Hi Tim -

Ran the DISKPART command and got this:

Here is what it returned:
152626 MB Disk 0 at Id 0 on atapi [MBR]
-:   Partition1 <EISA Utilities>      6150 MB  <   3147 MB free>
C:  Partition2 <NTFS>                68653 MB < 58942 MB free>
E:  Partition3 <NTFS>                 39622 MB < 35647 MBfree>
      Unpartitioned space               38194 MB
957  MB Disk on disk  [MBR]
D: Partition1 <KINGSTON> [FAT] 962 MB < 951 MB free>

ESC=Cancel D=Delete Partition

This provide any insights???

 

[Carl]

You didn't do it right, FIXMBR uses the device name rather than the
drive letter, for example:

fixmbr \device\harddisk0

Note the double "dd" in the device name (hard+disk)

To get a list of devices use the MAP command.

If the syntax is correct you will get a warning message and you will be
prompted to confirm the action.  If you answer Y (yes) to confirm the
action you will receive a message stating that a new master boot record
was successfully written.  If the syntax is incorrect you will be
returned to the > prompt without any message of any kind.

You can also run the FIXMBR command without specifying any device and
the MBR will be written to the boot device, here again you will receive
a warning message and be asked to confirm the action.

Fixmbr will surely dislodge the GRUB loader from the MBR, you just have
to use the proper syntax.

John

Hi John -

Thank you for weighing in.

The MAP command returned this:

? NTFS 6150MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition1
C: NTFS 68653MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition2
E: NTFS 39621MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition3
D: FAT16 963MB \Device\Harddisk1\Partition1

What's the next step, gentlemen?

Many thanks, once again, for your time and patience.

Carl

 

[Tim Meddick]

Twayne,
The OP has a NetBook - no cd\dvd drive - no floppy.
(or I would have suggested using a Bart's PE cd....)

He has gone to some trouble to get Recovery Console on a USB drive and can boot and
load RC from that.

I would have thought - and here's the problem - that the RC command - FIXMBR - should
have over-written, and got rid of, the <grub> loader....

But it refuses to budge!

==

Cheers, Tim Meddick, Peckham, London.

 

[Tim Meddick]

I rarely use either the MAP or the DISPART command and if I have a major problem,
similar to yours, I always use an M$-DOS boot disk.

The difference being that the DOS command FDISK - does return volume labels (where
they exist) on partitions.

The thing is, without knowing which partition is which - you might be deleting the
netbook's recovery partition - should it have one.

My best guess would be :

-: Partition1 <EISA Utilities> 6150 MB = RECOVERY PARTITION
C: Partition2 <NTFS> 68653 MB = WINDOWS PARTITION
E: Partition3 <NTFS> 39622 MB = UBUNTU PARTITION
D: Partition1 <KINGSTON> [FAT] = YOUR USB DRIVE

......so, you could try deleting E: Partition3 <NTFS> 39622 MB ....(unless you know
different - that this is NOT the UBUNTU partition!)

My evidence for this is that as you are actually logged in to C:\Windows while you
are running Recovery Console, the partition before it must have been there before or
at the installation of the C: partition - it has no drive-letter associated with it,
so it's probably a hidden partition - usually this means the recovery partition.
That just leaves Partition3 (E

So, as I said, unless you know differently, delete Partition3 (E using DISKPART
then reboot back into the Recovery Console and check it has been deleted using
DISKPART again.

Then try :

FIXMBR
FIXBOOT C:

....once more......

At the end of the day, since I am 99% sure you have a (intact) recovery partition, as
you are booting you should be seeing a message at the bottom of the screen, something
like "Press F10 for recovery options " .

However, should this be the case, and you use the NetBook's in-built recovery
option - it will copy the factory-state Windows installation back to the C: drive -
over-writing your old XP and all the data (music & videos) you may have stored there.

==

Cheers, Tim Meddick, Peckham, London.

You didn't do it right, FIXMBR uses the device name rather than the
drive letter, for example:

fixmbr \device\harddisk0

Note the double "dd" in the device name (hard+disk)

To get a list of devices use the MAP command.

If the syntax is correct you will get a warning message and you will be
prompted to confirm the action. If you answer Y (yes) to confirm the
action you will receive a message stating that a new master boot record
was successfully written. If the syntax is incorrect you will be
returned to the > prompt without any message of any kind.

You can also run the FIXMBR command without specifying any device and
the MBR will be written to the boot device, here again you will receive
a warning message and be asked to confirm the action.

Fixmbr will surely dislodge the GRUB loader from the MBR, you just have
to use the proper syntax.

John

Hi John -

Thank you for weighing in.

The MAP command returned this:

? NTFS 6150MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition1
C: NTFS 68653MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition2
E: NTFS 39621MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition3
D: FAT16 963MB \Device\Harddisk1\Partition1

What's the next step, gentlemen?

Many thanks, once again, for your time and patience.

Carl

 

[Carl]

PS re the Subject line: You do not "clone" XP to a drive. A "clone" IS a
hard drive that contains the operating system. What you do is replace a bad
drive with a "cloned" drive, and in theory it will start right up.
   Your problem could be in your understanding of what you're trying to
achieve. Whatever it is, it is not "cloning ... back to your HD".

HTH,

Thanks for weighing in, Twayne -

You are right; I used the wrong terminology.

One of the big surprises and disappointments of my introduction to
Microsoft Windows was to learn that, after making a clone of your HD,
if you have trouble, such as I am now having, that you could NOT copy
back the clone of your HD to your internal HD.

Macintosh allows this and instead of backing up each week, I use
SuperDuper to clone my OS to an external HD. Haven't had to copy that
clone back to my internal HD since Apple came out with OSX, but I did
have to do so once or twice under OS 9 and its predecessors.

Carl

 

[John John - MVP]

Thanks for weighing in, Twayne -

You are right; I used the wrong terminology.

One of the big surprises and disappointments of my introduction to
Microsoft Windows was to learn that, after making a clone of your HD,
if you have trouble, such as I am now having, that you could NOT copy
back the clone of your HD to your internal HD.

Macintosh allows this and instead of backing up each week, I use
SuperDuper to clone my OS to an external HD. Haven't had to copy that
clone back to my internal HD since Apple came out with OSX, but I did
have to do so once or twice under OS 9 and its predecessors.

What do you mean "you could NOT copy back the clone of your HD to your
internal HD". We create clones and images all the time here and restore
them back anytime without any problems. Of course, Windows PCs are much
more varied than Macs, PCs come in a mutltitude of hardware
configurations so moving clones or restoring images to different
computers is not generally supported, whereas a Mac is a Mac is a Mac,
so moving a clone or restoring an image to another Mac might not be a
problem.

John

 

[John John - MVP]

I rarely use either the MAP or the DISPART command and if I have a major
problem, similar to yours, I always use an M$-DOS boot disk.

The difference being that the DOS command FDISK - does return volume
labels (where they exist) on partitions.

The thing is, without knowing which partition is which - you might be
deleting the netbook's recovery partition - should it have one.

My best guess would be :

-: Partition1 <EISA Utilities> 6150 MB = RECOVERY PARTITION
C: Partition2 <NTFS> 68653 MB = WINDOWS PARTITION
E: Partition3 <NTFS> 39622 MB = UBUNTU PARTITION

Begs the question of why would Ubuntu be installed on a proprietary NTFS
partition?

D: Partition1 <KINGSTON> [FAT] = YOUR USB DRIVE

.....so, you could try deleting E: Partition3 <NTFS> 39622 MB
....(unless you know different - that this is NOT the UBUNTU partition!)

My evidence for this is that as you are actually logged in to C:\Windows
while you are running Recovery Console, the partition before it must
have been there before or at the installation of the C: partition - it
has no drive-letter associated with it, so it's probably a hidden
partition - usually this means the recovery partition. That just leaves
Partition3 (E

I think that at this stage finding the Active status of the partitions
might help. Carl (or Bob) would need to create a Windows 98 Startup
disk on USB and use Fdisk to see what is going on with the active
partition flag. I haven't ever made a W98 bootable USB stick but a
quick search on the net leads to sites like this with all the
information and downloads for the necessary files:

http://www.bay-wolf.com/usbmemstick.htm
How to Create a bootable USB Memory Key

You should be able to toggle the active partition with Fdisk but I would
also stick PowerQuest's (Symantec} 16-bit PtEdit utility on the stick:
http://www.goodells.net/multiboot/tools.htm

John

 

[Carl]

What do you mean "you could NOT copy back the clone of your HD to your
internal HD".  We create clones and images all the time here and restore
them back anytime without any problems.  Of course, Windows PCs are much
more varied than Macs, PCs come in a mutltitude of hardware
configurations so moving clones or restoring images to different
computers is not generally supported, whereas a Mac is a Mac is a Mac,
so moving a clone or restoring an image to another Mac might not be a
problem.

John

John -

Lest my misuse of terminology confuses the situation, let me explain.

What I should have said was I was told, that for licensing reasons, M/
S will not allow you to boot your machine from Windows on an external
USB hard drive.

I have a Seagate external HD.

I used Seagate's free software to clone my Netbook's HD to an external
USB HD.

If I connect that USB HD, boot up, change the Boot Device Priority to
list that USB HD first, then exit and save the configuration, I get
nothing but a blinking white cursor on a black screen.

The first time this happened, I asked on this forum, I believe, and
was told that what I was doing was not possible because M/S did not
allow you to boot from an external HD.

I just tried it, and I am looking at the blinking cursor.

Was I misinformed?

Carl

 

[Carl]

I rarely use either the MAP or the DISPART command and if I have a major
problem, similar to yours, I always use an M$-DOS boot disk.

The difference being that the DOS command FDISK - does return volume
labels (where they exist) on partitions.

The thing is, without knowing which partition is which - you might be
deleting the netbook's  recovery partition - should it have one.

My best guess would be :

-: Partition1 <EISA Utilities> 6150 MB  = RECOVERY PARTITION
C: Partition2 <NTFS> 68653 MB = WINDOWS PARTITION
E: Partition3 <NTFS> 39622 MB =  UBUNTU PARTITION

Begs the question of why would Ubuntu be installed on a proprietary NTFS
partition?

D:  Partition1 <KINGSTON> [FAT] = YOUR USB DRIVE

.....so, you could try deleting E: Partition3 <NTFS> 39622 MB
....(unless you know different - that this is NOT the UBUNTU partition!)

My evidence for this is that as you are actually logged in to C:\Windows
while you are running Recovery Console, the partition before it must
have been there before or at the installation of the C: partition - it
has no drive-letter associated with it, so it's probably a hidden
partition - usually this means the recovery partition. That just leaves
Partition3 (E

I think that at this stage finding the Active status of the partitions
might help.  Carl (or Bob) would need to create a Windows 98 Startup
disk on USB and use Fdisk to see what is going on with the active
partition flag.  I haven't ever made a W98 bootable USB stick but a
quick search on the net leads to sites like this with all the
information and downloads for the necessary files:

http://www.bay-wolf.com/usbmemstick.htm
How to Create a bootable USB Memory Key

You should be able to toggle the active partition with Fdisk but I would
also stick PowerQuest's (Symantec} 16-bit PtEdit utility on the stick:http://www.goodells.net/multiboot/tools.htm

John

Gentlemen -

I DO NOT BELIEVE IT!!!!

It worked!

I cannot thank you enough.

Here's what I did:

I deleted the E partition.

I ran MAP again

Returned:
? NTFS 6150MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition1
C: NTFS 68653MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition2
F: NTFS 39621MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition3
D: FAT16 963MB \Device\Harddisk1\Partition1

I removed the USB flash drive and restarted, and it booted normally,
into Windows and all appears fine.

If you two would bear with me, I will summarize all of the guidance,
step by step, that you give me and post it at the end of this thread
plus post it on the Samsung Netbook site for others having this
problem.

I know there are many others with the problem because when I Googled
the GRUB problem, I got multiple hits but none of them worked for me
and most relied on an external HD and booting from a Windows CD.

Tim said it could be done w/o an external HD and he was right.

I'll try to write my summary this weekend and post it back here.

BTW, just to be sure, shut down my computer and started again and
again, all is well.

My deepest thanks,
Carl

BTW, when I start up , I am offered the choice of booting up in either
M/S Windows XP Home Edition or Ubuntu, so there must be something on
the HD that I need to get rid of in order to weed Ubuntu entirely from
my HD, no?

 

[John John - MVP]

John -

Lest my misuse of terminology confuses the situation, let me explain.

What I should have said was I was told, that for licensing reasons, M/
S will not allow you to boot your machine from Windows on an external
USB hard drive.

I have a Seagate external HD.

I used Seagate's free software to clone my Netbook's HD to an external
USB HD.

If I connect that USB HD, boot up, change the Boot Device Priority to
list that USB HD first, then exit and save the configuration, I get
nothing but a blinking white cursor on a black screen.

The first time this happened, I asked on this forum, I believe, and
was told that what I was doing was not possible because M/S did not
allow you to boot from an external HD.

I just tried it, and I am looking at the blinking cursor.

Was I misinformed?

This has nothing to do with Microsoft's licensing, it' a technical
limitation of the Windows operating system. What happens with Windows
is that the USB stack is initialized well after the Windows session
manager has started, so in essence Windows can't boot off a USB drive
because Windows has to initialize the stack before it can use it, a
catch 22 kind of situation. If you search the internet you will find
information on how some have hacked the stack drivers to make them boot
devices which in turn allows the ntldr boot manager to load the stack
before the session manager is started. This is unsupported by
Microsoft, they have never bothered rewriting the boot up routine to
have ntldr load the stack so Windows can't boot off a USB drive.

John

 

[Tim Meddick]

I am so pleased! (told you that you'd get there in the end!)

Concerning the bogus menu entry on startup.....

When you ran the FIXBOOT C: command, on your merry travels, Windows re-wrote your
BOOT.INI file that deals with the start(up) menu (which lives in the root of your
[C:] system drive) adding any valid operating systems it could detect at the time.

When you did this, the UBUNTU partition STILL EXISTED, but now does not, so if you
did selected this option at boot now, I very much doubt you'd get anything but an
system error.

To get rid of it, either :

1). Goto "Control Panel" -> "System Properties" -> "Advanced" tab -> "Startup and
Recovery" (Settings button).

....and in the "System Startup" [top] section, press on the "Edit" button.

Highlight and delete the ONE line containing the word "Ubuntu" and save / close.

- you won't see the "Ubuntu" menu item on startup any more.


2). Type MSCONFIG into the "Run" box on the start menu and click on the BOOT.INI
"tab".

Press the button marked "Check all boot paths" This should result in all invalid
entries in the menu to be removed.

Press [ok] to save and exit.

3). Open a command prompt, and type the following command :

attrib -r -h -s c:\boot.ini
notepad c:\boot.ini

....then edit the file (as in 1), removing the line that contains the word "Ubuntu"
and then "save" and exit. Again, the offending menu entry will be gone....

==

Cheers, Tim Meddick, Peckham, London.

I rarely use either the MAP or the DISPART command and if I have a major
problem, similar to yours, I always use an M$-DOS boot disk.

The difference being that the DOS command FDISK - does return volume
labels (where they exist) on partitions.

The thing is, without knowing which partition is which - you might be
deleting the netbook's recovery partition - should it have one.

My best guess would be :

-: Partition1 <EISA Utilities> 6150 MB = RECOVERY PARTITION
C: Partition2 <NTFS> 68653 MB = WINDOWS PARTITION
E: Partition3 <NTFS> 39622 MB = UBUNTU PARTITION

Begs the question of why would Ubuntu be installed on a proprietary NTFS
partition?

D: Partition1 <KINGSTON> [FAT] = YOUR USB DRIVE

.....so, you could try deleting E: Partition3 <NTFS> 39622 MB
....(unless you know different - that this is NOT the UBUNTU partition!)

My evidence for this is that as you are actually logged in to C:\Windows
while you are running Recovery Console, the partition before it must
have been there before or at the installation of the C: partition - it
has no drive-letter associated with it, so it's probably a hidden
partition - usually this means the recovery partition. That just leaves
Partition3 (E

I think that at this stage finding the Active status of the partitions
might help. Carl (or Bob) would need to create a Windows 98 Startup
disk on USB and use Fdisk to see what is going on with the active
partition flag. I haven't ever made a W98 bootable USB stick but a
quick search on the net leads to sites like this with all the
information and downloads for the necessary files:

http://www.bay-wolf.com/usbmemstick.htm
How to Create a bootable USB Memory Key

You should be able to toggle the active partition with Fdisk but I would
also stick PowerQuest's (Symantec} 16-bit PtEdit utility on the
stick:http://www.goodells.net/multiboot/tools.htm

John

Gentlemen -

I DO NOT BELIEVE IT!!!!

It worked!

I cannot thank you enough.

Here's what I did:

I deleted the E partition.

I ran MAP again

Returned:
? NTFS 6150MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition1
C: NTFS 68653MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition2
F: NTFS 39621MB \Device\Harddisk0\Partition3
D: FAT16 963MB \Device\Harddisk1\Partition1

I removed the USB flash drive and restarted, and it booted normally,
into Windows and all appears fine.

If you two would bear with me, I will summarize all of the guidance,
step by step, that you give me and post it at the end of this thread
plus post it on the Samsung Netbook site for others having this
problem.

I know there are many others with the problem because when I Googled
the GRUB problem, I got multiple hits but none of them worked for me
and most relied on an external HD and booting from a Windows CD.

Tim said it could be done w/o an external HD and he was right.

I'll try to write my summary this weekend and post it back here.

BTW, just to be sure, shut down my computer and started again and
again, all is well.

My deepest thanks,
Carl

BTW, when I start up , I am offered the choice of booting up in either
M/S Windows XP Home Edition or Ubuntu, so there must be something on
the HD that I need to get rid of in order to weed Ubuntu entirely from
my HD, no?

 

[Carl]

In message

[]

Yes, you can.
[]

What I should have said was I was told, that for licensing reasons, M/
S will not allow you to boot your machine from Windows on an external
USB hard drive.

As another has said, it's technical rather than licencing reasons (and
there are people who've hacked it so that it can be done).

I have a Seagate external HD.

I used Seagate's free software to clone my Netbook's HD to an external
USB HD.

Very wise. (Not wise not to be sure how to restore it, though.)

If I connect that USB HD, boot up, change the Boot Device Priority to
list that USB HD first, then exit and save the configuration, I get
nothing but a blinking white cursor on a black screen.

The first time this happened, I asked on this forum, I believe, and
was told that what I was doing was not possible because M/S did not
allow you to boot from an external HD.

I just tried it, and I am looking at the blinking cursor.

Was I misinformed?

[]
You can clone your HD (to all sorts of things - USB, DVD, external HD).
You can copy the clone back to your HD, for example after a corruption,
and it will restore a system that works as it did when you made the
clone.

You cannot boot from whatever it is you cloned to - only the original
(or a replacement) HD after you've done the cloning-back.

Whatever software you used to make the clone should have offered to make
some boot media that would be able to do the cloning-back. (I suppose it
is still valid to claim it's a cloning utility if it doesn't do this,
but it's not a lot of use without it.)
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G.5AL-IS-P--Ch++(p)Ar@T0H+Sh0!:`)DNAf
**http://www.soft255.demon.co.uk/G6JPG-PC/JPGminPC.htmfor ludicrously
outdated thoughts on PCs. **

A language is a dialect that has an army and a navy. -Max Weinreich, linguist
and author (1894-1969)

Thanks for that explanation, J.P.

This weekend, I will make another clone using the Seagate software
and watch carefully to see if there is any offer to make some sort of
boot media that will enable the clone to be copied back to the
internal HD.

Perhaps I missed it on my first clone; I am very new to Windows.

Carl.