How to fix one of two installs c:\windows and c:\windows2 ?

[LoneTreeTechy]

My original Windows XP Home edition became corrupt and the blue screen kept
coming up due to bad video drivers. If I disable the blue screen, the machine
would just reboot itself over and over. I tried removing the bad drivers,
safe mode, command prompt, various Windows repair utilities...

Finally I just used the included OEM Windows repair CD and it let me install
a second instance of Windows on the same file system - I installed it to
c:\windows2.

All my files and programs are physically on the disk, but I can't run
Office, for example, nor can I seem to access my old user profiles, settings,
etc. I don't want to go through the hassle of reinstalling hundreds of
programs, so...

Is there a way to manually repair the first windows installation while
booted into the second installation, or merge the programs and settings?

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

My original Windows XP Home edition became corrupt and the blue screen
kept
coming up due to bad video drivers. If I disable the blue screen, the
machine
would just reboot itself over and over. I tried removing the bad drivers,
safe mode, command prompt, various Windows repair utilities...

Finally I just used the included OEM Windows repair CD and it let me
install
a second instance of Windows on the same file system - I installed it to
c:\windows2.

All my files and programs are physically on the disk, but I can't run
Office, for example, nor can I seem to access my old user profiles,
settings,
etc. I don't want to go through the hassle of reinstalling hundreds of
programs, so...

Is there a way to manually repair the first windows installation while
booted into the second installation, or merge the programs and settings?

Sorry, the answer is "no" to both questions.

 

[LoneTreeTechy]

Sorry, the answer is "no" to both questions.

Well, then, how do I delete (as opposed to 'uninstall') the bad drivers? I
don't know where they are located or how they are initialized. I'm sure if I
did that, I could then successfully just boot into the original installation.

Thanks - for helping me on this - better than paying $59 for tech support to
tell me "No." ... lol ... ;-)

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

Well, then, how do I delete (as opposed to 'uninstall') the bad drivers? I
don't know where they are located or how they are initialized. I'm sure if
I
did that, I could then successfully just boot into the original
installation.

Thanks - for helping me on this - better than paying $59 for tech support
to
tell me "No." ... lol ... ;-)

- How long since this version became unuseable?
- Does it fix things to boot into Safe Mode of the
old version of Windows?

 

[LoneTreeTechy]

- How long since this version became unuseable?
- Does it fix things to boot into Safe Mode of the
old version of Windows?

The problems were on-and-off for a while a few months ago, but fairly
recently the cycle of endless reboots became unstoppable. I haven't done
anything since installing the new WINDOWS2. Safe mode doesn't help - the
video drivers (based on what I can gather) are crashing the system. I even
tried reverting to the OEM video card, but the ATI Rage drivers still
interfere. Plug-n-play doesn't seem to work in reverse.

If I knew how to remove all the drivers from the original configuration, I
could just boot-er-up and reinstall whatever was required from that point.
What do you think?