windows cannot start because the following file is missing... system

[nutz]

Had an error some 3 months ago where system posted but then failed to
continue, discovered that running the XP CD and running 'fixboot' from
the recovery console got me running again. However this happened
irregularly for a few more weeks, sometimes the system would start,
other times it needed a fixboot first. Eventually I replaced the CMOS
battery and the problem seemed to go away.
Yesterday I get the error message above and Googling for advice came
across the bit about booting the recovery console from the CD and
renaming system as system.bak etc. Did that, computer booted, but then
gave me a message that the default profile could not be loaded and that
a temporary profile would be used instead. Okay, created a new admin
profile and booted from that, then began process of reinstalling
drivers etc...
Finally finished it all last night, new profile set up correctly,
rebooted and... Bang, back to "windows cannot start because" etc.
Kicked cat, cried, began again from scratch. Did the renaming etc again
and finally got back into windows. Each time I boot the pc that it WILL
get into windows, i get a message saying one of my disks needs to be
checked for consistency. Chkdsk runs but takes an age to complete, then
reboots, loads okay.
But now that the system file has corrupted/lost twice in only a day, Im
worried that I'll go through all this pain only to have it re-occur
tomorrow. Whats causing these repetitive errors?

 

[nutz]

continuing...
every single reboot generates a disk check, no matter how well windows
shuts down. file verification is completed in a few seconds, verifying
indexes shoots up to 12% but then takes three or four seconds for each
1% increment from then on. When its finished, theres no complaints
about errors found, it just reboots and loads correctly.
I know I can cancel these disk checks for ten seconds before they
start, but how can I persuade windows that the CURRENT disk status is
actually correct and that it doesnt need to check it each time it
starts?

 

[Og]

Sounds your hard drive is failing. Visit the manufacturer's website for your
drive, obtain their diagnostics utility, and run it.
Steve

 

[dstockton]

I concur, you have a hardware failure. Usually it would be the hard
drive, but it could be memory or system board also. In any case you are
looking at a rebuild.

 

[l]

There should be a report in event viewer after the disk check is done. Click
on Application, then click the source tab to find the Winlogon
listings..that's where you will see the report, which may give you more
information.

 

[nutz]

I concur, you have a hardware failure. Usually it would be the hard
drive, but it could be memory or system board also. In any case you are
looking at a rebuild.

Thanks for the reply. Its not a hard drive failure - see below - but I
guess there could be memory problems. Or maybe that new CMOS battery I
put in wasnt very good and only lasted a few months?

After getting windows back from the first set of issues with a new CMOS
battery, I swapped the hard drives for a spare one - kept the old
master in as a slave. Ive got a cover CD version of Acronis True Image,
not the latest version obviously, and used that to clone the old drive
to the new one, and its THAT drive thats now giving me issues this time
round. That makes me think it isnt hard drive related, unless of course
I could have copied the problem from the cack drive to the new one when
I cloned it?

 

[Og]

A failing IDE controller can mimic a drive failure.
Steve

 

[nutz]

A failing IDE controller can mimic a drive failure.
Steve

How am I going to check which particular piece of hardware is faulty
tho? I dont have spare RAM etc sitting around to simply swap out and
see if the problem resurfaces ;o(

And sorry to subvert the thread from original topic, but Im having
trouble with the recommended actions with a XP CD too. After booting
from the drive, I do have the option of the recovery console by
pressing R, but if I ignore that one and F8 the EULA, there isnt (or
doesnt appear to be) another recovery option from then on. It finds the
drive and complains that there is an existing win installation on it,
but the only options are to format it in various guises or leave as is
and continue install over the top. If I select that, Im told that I
could lose the My Docs folder etc, so thats definitely not what I want.
In some of the MS site articles, Im informed about Fast Recovery versus
Manual Recovery, but following the instructions to get to either of
them doesnt do a damn thing - it just boots straight into the recovery
console.

 

[Malke]

How am I going to check which particular piece of hardware is faulty
tho? I dont have spare RAM etc sitting around to simply swap out and
see if the problem resurfaces ;o(

And sorry to subvert the thread from original topic, but Im having
trouble with the recommended actions with a XP CD too. After booting
from the drive, I do have the option of the recovery console by
pressing R, but if I ignore that one and F8 the EULA, there isnt (or
doesnt appear to be) another recovery option from then on. It finds
the drive and complains that there is an existing win installation on
it, but the only options are to format it in various guises or leave
as is and continue install over the top. If I select that, Im told
that I could lose the My Docs folder etc, so thats definitely not what
I want. In some of the MS site articles, Im informed about Fast
Recovery versus Manual Recovery, but following the instructions to get
to either of them doesnt do a damn thing - it just boots straight into
the recovery console.

If you don't have the spare parts lying around, take the machine to a
professional computer repair shop (not your local version of
BigStoreUSA). You can back up your data first by either slaving the
hard drive in another machine or booting with Knoppix (a Linux distro
that runs from cd). Or you can have the computer shop do this for you.

Moving the hard drive to another machine will show whether the problem
is with the drive or the motherboard. Booting with Knoppix will show
whether the problem is hardware or software (Windows).

A CMOS battery would have nothing to do with your issues.

Malke

 

[Guest]

Personally I would go into the aministrative tools\event viewer\system log
and look at any red X's corresponding to the time of your problem. Double
clicking on the X will open a details window with more detailed info. This
may look like gibberish to you, but if you post the exact message then we can
focus our attentions much easier. At the very least you should recognize a
module name that will give you search for the problem some focus. I also
would make sure to run a full set of chkdsk functions. There are actually
five modules so go>start>run and type in chkdsk /r and then type a Y in the
command line window and hit enter on your keyboard and reboot. This may take
up to an hour, so grab a coffee and your favourite paper. Running the chkdsk
/r will recover\repair any bad sectors that you may have on the HDD. Post
back after you give this a try or after looking at the event viewer. TTFN.

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Had an error some 3 months ago where system posted but then failed to
continue, discovered that running the XP CD and running 'fixboot' from
the recovery console got me running again. However this happened
irregularly for a few more weeks, sometimes the system would start,
other times it needed a fixboot first. Eventually I replaced the CMOS
battery and the problem seemed to go away.
Yesterday I get the error message above and Googling for advice came
across the bit about booting the recovery console from the CD and
renaming system as system.bak etc. Did that, computer booted, but then
gave me a message that the default profile could not be loaded and that
a temporary profile would be used instead. Okay, created a new admin
profile and booted from that, then began process of reinstalling
drivers etc...
Finally finished it all last night, new profile set up correctly,
rebooted and... Bang, back to "windows cannot start because" etc.
Kicked cat, cried, began again from scratch. Did the renaming etc again
and finally got back into windows. Each time I boot the pc that it WILL
get into windows, i get a message saying one of my disks needs to be
checked for consistency. Chkdsk runs but takes an age to complete, then
reboots, loads okay.
But now that the system file has corrupted/lost twice in only a day, Im
worried that I'll go through all this pain only to have it re-occur
tomorrow. Whats causing these repetitive errors?

Just guessing, since you didn't quote the exact error message:

How to Recover from a Corrupted Registry that Prevents Windows XP from
Starting
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;307545

Once you've recovered, you might want to look here, as well:

How to Troubleshoot Registry Corruption Issues
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;822705


--

Bruce Chambers

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