Missing or corrupt file

[William J. Lunsford]

I have a friend who cannot boot into Windows XP Home on a Gateway 500S PC.
He gets a message regarding a missing or corrupt
\WINNT\SYSTEM32\CONFIG\SYSTEM. The message says to reboot with the
installation CD in the drive and press R at the first screen. I tried
booting into safe mode and safe mode with command prompt, but I ended up
with the same error message. I got to the Recovery Console, but I have no
experience extracting a file here, and, all of the instructions I could find
were very confusing.

I found instructions on the Gateway Website for a Repair Installation, but I
was unable to follow the first 4 steps of the instructions because I can't
get into Windows. Here are the first 4 steps:
1.. From the Start menu, click Run.

2.. In the Run dialog box, in the Open text box, type: cmd. Click OK.
View Picture

3.. Delete the undo_guimode.txt file. In the C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe
dialog box, type: del /a /f c:\windows\system32\undo_guimode.txt. Press the
ENTER key.
View Picture
Note: If a "Could not find C:\Windows\System32\Undo_guimode.txt" message
appears, then the file was not created. Proceed to step 4.


4.. In the C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe dialog box, type: exit. Press
ENTER.
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Any help you can give me will be appreciated.

 

[dev]

/William J. Lunsford/ said:

I have a friend who cannot boot into Windows XP Home on a Gateway 500S PC.
He gets a message regarding a missing or corrupt
\WINNT\SYSTEM32\CONFIG\SYSTEM. The message says to reboot with the
installation CD in the drive and press R at the first screen. I tried
booting into safe mode and safe mode with command prompt, but I ended up
with the same error message. I got to the Recovery Console, but I have no
experience extracting a file here, and, all of the instructions I could find
were very confusing.

I found instructions on the Gateway Website for a Repair Installation, but I
was unable to follow the first 4 steps of the instructions because I can't
get into Windows. Here are the first 4 steps:
1.. From the Start menu, click Run.

2.. In the Run dialog box, in the Open text box, type: cmd. Click OK.
View Picture

3.. Delete the undo_guimode.txt file. In the C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe
dialog box, type: del /a /f c:\windows\system32\undo_guimode.txt. Press the
ENTER key.
View Picture
Note: If a "Could not find C:\Windows\System32\Undo_guimode.txt" message
appears, then the file was not created. Proceed to step 4.


4.. In the C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe dialog box, type: exit. Press
ENTER.
View Picture

Try a boot into Safe Mode, by hitting F8 just before the "Starting
Windows" screen would appear (takes a bit of practice).
Choose LAST GOOD.

If that does nothing, use a working PC to read this first...
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;q823614
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_sys32.htm

Related info is here...
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;q307545
describes a three-step process to extract a copy of the registry
from the System Restore SVI folder.

Info on dealing with corruption issues...
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;822705

Reinstall/repair tutorials (if needed) are here...
http://WWW.WEBTREE.CA/windowsxp/
http://michaelstevenstech.com

After your system is restored, the ERUNT utility available here may
make it easier to fix the problem if it recurs...
http://HOME.T-ONLINE.DE/home/lars.hederer/erunt

If the problem persists, try swapping current RAM (even if it checks
good) for a single, high-quality 512Mb chip. XP reportedly is sensitive
to memory timing.

 

[Edward J. Neth]

You're not going to be able to restore that file - it's not a Windows file
per se, but one of the registry hives that has been damaged.

Before you proceed to try any repairs, is there anything on the disc that is
not backed up and irreplaceable? If so, remove the hard drive, install
another (or a new one), install a fresh copy of Windows XP to the new drive,
and then reconnect the bad drive as slave. Copy the data over to the good
drive.

If there's nothing irreplaceable (i.e., you have nothing left to lose), you
can try Microsoft's steps for registry repair. More often than not, they do
not work, and you wind up reinstalling XP (after formatting the drive).
Before you try that on this drive, do a full scan of it -- including a
surface scan -- with scandisk, or preferably, the utilility provided for
that purpose by the drive's manufacturer. If you see any bad sectors, ask
Gateway for a replacement if the system is still under warranty, or bin it
and replace it with a new one if it is not.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;322756

 

[William J. Lunsford]

Thanks for the information. Your help is appreciated.

 

[William J. Lunsford]

Thanks for the information. Your help is appreciated.