[lordoxford]

Hello! I'm on a borrowed machine so your offered malware download is a nogo.
At wit's end
1. Acer tm4150 OEM disks no help.
2. Bart's just stops.
3."Constructed floppy" gives "Win could not start; file missing or corrupt... HAL.DLL" with WIN XP or Safe mode and gives "...hardware config problem" with recovery console.
4.Downloaded "Fixit" CD boots to(a)DOS; accesses 2 of the 3 partitions (C: & D: not E:)
and all dirs on C: & D: accessed OK and seem OK. I used "fdisk /mbr" on this but WIN XP fails to load.
5. Used the (downloaded) six floppies' XP Windows source. Boots ok, all six are read OK
gives: "STOP: 0x0000007B (0xF78DA63C), (...0034), (0), (0).
6. Conventional HDD load just leaves BIOS cycling repeatedly with no message from loader.
Would greatly appreciate a bit of help here!

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Just talking to myself now:
I guess I made that too dense - six different methods and still no load. Dozens of "Viewers" and not one specific suggestion from any of you!
I can add that a second "Fixitall" disk loads Puppy Linux and needs a crash course in Unix to handle (I last used Unix on a DEC10 about 30 years ago and don't want to start that again!).
SO come on chaps - how do I recover my XP?
Cheers!
Pete.

[lordoxford]

Just talking to myself now:
I guess I made that too dense - six different methods and still no load. Dozens of "Viewers" and not one specific suggestion from any of you!
I can add that a second "Fixitall" disk loads Puppy Linux and needs a crash course in Unix to handle (I last used Unix on a DEC10 about 30 years ago and don't want to start that again!).
SO come on chaps - how do I recover my XP?
Cheers!
Pete.

[happyrock]

first...lets make sure its not your memory going bad...get memtest + here....
the lowdown is here..
get the 2nd one down and burn the ISO file to a cd and then boot it from the cd drive...

if you don't have a burning program that will burn .ISO files go here and get burncdcc ..a small FAST no frills iso
burning program...

NOTE...do not put a blank cd in until burncdcc opens the tray for you
1. Start by clicking on BurnCDCC.exe
2. Browse to the ISO file you want to burn on cd/dvd ....in this case its memtest86.iso
3. Select the ISO file
4. click on Start

make sure in the bios the cd drive is the first boot device....put the cd in the cd drive..boot your computer....
let memtest run for at least 3 hours...if it starts showing any errors during that time then you will have to replace the RAM...no errors after 3 hours just press Esc to end the tests and we will try some other tests..


when you can't even boot into safe mode you will have to repair xp...

for the how to repair your operating system guides...
go here...

if you don't have a xp cd you will have to borrow one from a friend or coworker...
it has to be the same flavor of xp you have installed...IE: if you have xp pro...the one you borrow has to be xp pro

if/when you do get it to boot up...run your malware tools...if thats not possible then go to the malware foroms and get their help


for the future...don't reply to your own topic...those that can help see replies and think someone is already helping but the reality is your talking to yourself....

[lordoxford]

Thanks for your reply. I'd never have suspected a mem problem. Truth is: I had just upgraded the memory to the max for an Acer TM 4150. I'll reinstall the original (if I can remember where I put it) before following your systematic methods.

[lordoxford]

It turns out the borrowed machine can't burn CDs (Win2K on a Presario 1200); can I use a USB stick? The "Crippled" machine can boot from one OK.

[happyrock]

yep...

[lordoxford]

Hey, happyrock, thanks for your patience! I should be aware of all this since, when I started computing I worked on a secret project at an aircraft firm and the only "Machines" we had were Brunswiga hand wound calculators and a 200-amplifier analogue computer. 'course I had a 6" and a 12" slide rule!
Cheers, mate,
lox.

[happyrock]

it happens to lots of people...I have a neighbor that was a system admin for a large water company many years ago...
he actually helped buy and set up all the equipment and then ran it for about 10 years...he left there, got out of computers and now he is clueless on whats up with computers and OS and applications...it all changed and he didn't keep up so now is is almost a noob...

[lordoxford]

Well - it ran for well over 3 hrs, no errors. Had to put MEMTEST onto a USB floppy drive.

[happyrock]

then try the repair...the link is in my first post

[lordoxford]

OK - my dead machine is an ACER TM 4150 second-hand, preloaded XP, with three "Restore" CDs. Acer believes that "Restore" means "Make like new" ie "Destroy everything and stick a lot of inaccessable sys stuff in D: . . . etc". Obviously half my data are in D: now so, after Acer-restore there's no space left for my data - nor is there any data left. So I need a "Happyrock-restore".
Your first post ended with "Let's get started" - a bit of a tease!
I cannot borrow an XP home CD - in happier days I made a "Bart boot" and a "Bart PE" DVD both of which load OK, the PE disk even displays the "Microsoft Windows" screen and the loading indicator for ten seconds before overlaying it with his "Bart PE" screen. Can I repair from one of these? After all they've got all my XP stuff on them!

[happyrock]

I am kind of confused now...
did you use the reinstall disk and make it like new again...
did you partition the drive and put your data there...
or was d drive already there...if so that was a recovery partition and if you put any data there the recovery option is no longer available...

I know you said the borrowed system does not have a burner so you will need to get someone to burn a cd for you...once you have a cd with puppy on it and you load puppy you can make a bootable usb thumd drive...how to is here...

if you have data on the bad system that you do not have a backup of...
I would suggest you get puppy linux 2.16.1-seamonkey-fulldrivers.iso here...
if you don't have a burning program that will burn .ISO files go here and get burncdcc ..a small FAST no frills iso burning program...

NOTE...do not put a blank cd in until burncdcc opens the tray for you
1. click on BurnCDCC.exe
2. Browse to the ISO file you want to burn on cd/dvd ....in this case its puppy-2.16-seamonkey-fulldrivers.iso
3. Select the ISO file
4. click on Start

make sure in the bios the cd drive is the first boot device....

put the cd in the cd drive..boot your computer....puppy will boot and run totally in ram...
after you get it running and your at the desktop...you take the puppy linux cd out and then you can use the burner to copy all your data to cd/dvds
you can also use it to backup your data to usb flash drives or a external usb hard drive..just have it hooked to the computer when you boot up with puppy...
==========================
quick guide for saving data...music..files on a system that will not boot using puppy Linux..

this guide is for using usb flash drives but if you have a external hard drive just substitute your external drive where it says flash drive

after you get to puppy desktop..
click on the drives icon...looks like a flash drive...top row..it will list all the drives connected to

your computer...

click on the red icon for the drive you want to mount...in this case its a flash drive ...puppy will
mount the drive..the drive icon turns green when its mounted...
minimize the drives mounter window..you will need it again in a few minutes..
drag the right edge of it sideways to shrink it ...about half the width of the screen...then drag the window to the right edge of the screen...

now click on the icon that looks like a filing cabinet (kind of yellow) on the main drive...it should
already be green..
you will see a list of all the folders on the main drive Usually your C: drive..shrink that window tabout half the width of the screen...drag that window to the left side of the screen...
at this point you should have 2 windows open on your desktop..the flash drive on the right side..
go back to the folders on the C: drive...click on the documents and settings folder...then your user
name or all users..find the folders that contains your data..
drag and drop the folder with the data you want to make copies of to the flash drive window...

your options are to move ..copy ect...JUST COPY..if its to big you will have to open the folder and
drag and drop individual files until the flash drive is full...(I have a 120 GB external USB drive for
big data recovery jobs and a 16GB flash drive for the smaller jobs)..after you get the files copied to
the flash drive...
Click on the drives mounter you minimized earlier
UNMOUNT THE FLASH DRIVE by clicking on the green icon..you will once in awhile get error messages when
unmouting the drive..ignore them..when the flash drive icon turns red again its safe to remove the
flash drive..trot on over (stroll if you want to look cool) to another computer and plug in the flash
drive and copy all the data files ( I drag and drop) to the other computer..
make sure the other computer can read them...

now delete the data on the flash drive...take it back to the misbehaving computer and plug it in
again..click on the drives icon again and repeat until you have all your data transferred to the working
system..

[lordoxford]

Sorry to confuse! No, I realised that the Acer CDs would destroy my data, most of which is in drive D: & still there. I've got Puppy Linux - I'll check the version. I've got a 70GB USB HDD to take the data so I'll get on with it and report. Many thanks for your help - (so far!).

[happyrock]

make sure the USB HDD is connected when you boot up puppy

[lordoxford]

Will do that, thanks.
Awaiting weekend to get a proper run at this.
As far as I'm concerned this is going to be a "Cut the red wire" . . . ."NO, CUT THE ---" type of process!