Windows xp boot problem

  • Thread starter Thread starter dav1dl
  • Start date Start date
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dav1dl

My wife ran a reg cleaner that caused her computer to reboot after every
log-in at the log-in screen.
I tried to reload windows from my OEM disk and apparently the entire hard
drive was erased. We lost all the files. How can I retrieve them?
 
My wife ran a reg cleaner that caused her computer to reboot after every
log-in at the log-in screen.
Click to expand...


She should not have.

Registry cleaning programs are *all* snake oil. Cleaning of the
registry isn't needed and is dangerous. Leave the registry alone and
don't use any registry cleaner. Despite what many people think, and
what vendors of registry cleaning software try to convince you of,
having unused registry entries doesn't really hurt you.

The risk of a serious problem caused by a registry cleaner erroneously
removing an entry you need is far greater than any potential benefit
it may have.

I tried to reload windows from my OEM disk and apparently the entire hard
drive was erased. We lost all the files. How can I retrieve them?
Click to expand...


You can not. It's a tough lesson to learn the way you did, but you've
presumably been made aware of the need to backup data that's important
to you.
 
When reloading XP from an OEM disk, one usually invokes a program that
restores an image of the hard drive made by the PC maker as it was delivered
to you. This is different from a repair install of XP, which is supported
by the retail verison of XP. In a repair, only the windows files get
over-written. However, a repair will usually not fix registry problems,
since making a new default registry would lose all information about
installed programs.

While it is a little late to mention this, the system restore feature of XP
might have been able to fix the registry, by restoring it to a day or so
before the cleaner was used. XP restore points contain more than the
registry, but they do contain at least the registry. XP makes restore point
automatically, but you can always force a restore point to be created by
start --> help and support --> system restore --> create restore point.

It would have also been possible to manually restore the registry using the
XP recovery console run form the XP CD (if you have one) or form a
multi-floppy set (free download from Microsoft). See the following for
details on how to manually restore the XP registry:

http://www.pchell.com/support/recoverfromcorruptedregistry.shtml

As for any personal files that were on the PC, they are probably gone. The
act of restoring an image overwrites most of the hard drive. There is a
very small chance that some personal files were stored beyond the size of
the restored image, and their pattern of ones and zeros may be intact.
However, the index to them, the master file table (MFT), will have been
completely destroyed. Still, there are programs that can find files,
without using the MFT. These are in the general category called file
recovery programs or data recovery programs. For a list of many, some free,
try this link:

http://www.majorgeeks.com/downloads38.html

If you wish to try such a program, look for one that does not have to be
installed on the hard drive, since every write to the hard drive will
overwrite more of the old data. Some recovery programs can be run from a
bootable CD, that you write on a different PC, and some even come with a
bootable CD (Norton Utilities for exmple). When recovering files, be sure
NOT to write them to the internal hard drive, since that will overwrite more
of the old files. Use an external USB drive or a pen drive or similar.

For future reference, it would have been very easy to save copies of all
files, if you had not tried to do the OEM restore. Even if a PC is not
bootable into XP, it would be bootable from a CD that contains an operating
system. There are litterally dozens of free "live" CDs, meaning that they
will boot and run programs, but will not install on to the hard drive. My
favorite is KNOPPIX, which is a LINUX-based CD. KNOPIX is a big download,
about 700 Meg for the CD version. But, it will boot most PCs without extra
drivers, even PCs with SATA hard drives. It has a windows-like file manager
and can read from NTFS formatted drives, the default for XP. It can write
to external USB and firewire drives. It also comes with a full office
suite, a CD burner, etc. The DVD version, also free, comes with even more
programs. Link to KNOPPIX:

http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.html
 
it is highly unlikely that a
reg cleaner caused the
dysfuntion you are describing,
unless the registry was already
corrupted.

perhaps there was a lack
of maintenance being done
on the registry to keep it tuned
up or perhaps the computer
was writing something to the
registry when power was lost
to the system.

and yet there are still more
examples that can be attributed
to a corrupted registry.

-------------------

another consideration is if
your system was rebooting,
then there were other methods
to use to specifically addressed
the issue.

one method that could have
been used was to utilize the
fixboot command at the disk
prompt.

another command like the
chkdsk would have syncronized
the file system to the master
file table.

incidentally, the recovery console
can be started via the windows cd.

another option via the cd
was to use the repair installation
method, rather than a full
re-install of the o.s.

the repair would have simply
analyzed and compared your
system on the hd with the
genuine files on the cd and
make any replacements
necessary that could have
stabilized your system.
 
It's not highly unlikely, that is exactly what happened. His wife ran a
useless registry cleaner and it removed entries it shouldn't have and as
a result the computer couldn't boot. Registry cleaners are useless
programs that cause more harm than good.

John
 
"perhaps there was a lack
of maintenance being done
on the registry to keep it tuned
up "

And apart from using a registry cleaner, how does one go about "doing
maintenance" on the registry?
 
bill in texas, just shut
up.

your boots are in your
mouth, and they are
covered in cow dung.
 
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