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Offline Taxman

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XP Help
« on: September 30, 2008, 06:54:13 AM »
My son is studying abroad for this semester and just before leaving he informed me that his Dell Inspiron 600M was not working so I gave him one of my laptops.  It would not boot up it gave the Unmountable_boot_volume error.  I fixed that.  Now I get some internal registry error.  Any suggestions on how to fix this error? 
TIA
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Offline LC EFA

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Re: XP Help
« Reply #1 on: September 30, 2008, 07:08:10 AM »
Quote from: Taxman on September 30, 2008, 06:54:13 AM
My son is studying abroad for this semester and just before leaving he informed me that his Dell Inspiron 600M was not working so I gave him one of my laptops.  It would not boot up it gave the Unmountable_boot_volume error.  I fixed that.  Now I get some internal registry error.  Any suggestions on how to fix this error? 
TIA

If this was a job that landed on my desk at the former workplace, I'd run a disk checker over the drive to verify that it isn't failing, the SMART checker if available first, then other software.

unmountable boot volume tends to imply that there's been a problem with the HDD and it should be checked.

Then reinstall windows. It's the fastest least stressfull way of fixing it, especially if you have a factory supplied restore partition or CD's (AND A CURRENT BACKUP of DATA)

If that option isn't available it could take a while.

If the registry error is a BSOD that happens at boot time, the top part of that message would give me some more pointers.
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Offline Thor

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Re: XP Help
« Reply #2 on: October 03, 2008, 06:33:08 PM »
IF you can boot into safe mode (F8 after POST) you may be able to restore it to it's last known good configuration. I've had some success with that. With an original XP CD, you can also do a "repair", but I don't know if the Dell CD will do that.
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Offline Taxman

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Re: XP Help
« Reply #3 on: October 03, 2008, 08:20:15 PM »
I have gone out and found the help for this error.  It involves copying a set of files to a tmp file.  However one of the files will not copy.  What would happen if I just did a system restore....do I lose all his data?
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Offline LC EFA

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Re: XP Help
« Reply #4 on: October 03, 2008, 08:32:28 PM »
Quote from: Taxman on October 03, 2008, 08:20:15 PM
I have gone out and found the help for this error.  It involves copying a set of files to a tmp file.  However one of the files will not copy.  What would happen if I just did a system restore....do I lose all his data?

That one of the files won't copy implies there is a physical issue with the drive, or that the file is locked, if you're doing this from the recovery console the file shouldn't be locked.

Assuming you can get windows started to the point where you can run it ,  the Windows System Restore , willl "roll back" changes to an earlier date , you may lose application entries , but data should be untouched.

If you 're doing a system restore from a manufacturer supplied disk / partition it varies but the process will inform you as to what it will do.
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Offline Thor

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Re: XP Help
« Reply #5 on: October 03, 2008, 10:30:39 PM »
Which file is it?? If it's critical to XP, it may not be able to be copied into the OS.That's one thing I liked about DOS. You MAY be able to do it in Safe Mode w/ command prompt..... just a thought. Also check the attributes on the file. From the command line type: attrib (filename.ext) If it says A R S H, R S H,  S H, S   or  H, then reset the attributes by typing attrib -r -a -s -h  and THEN replace the file. Before you replace any file, let us know which file it is
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"The state must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the people. As long as the government is perceived as working for the benefit of the children, the people will happily endure almost any curtailment of liberty and almost any deprivation."- IBID

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Offline Woody

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Re: XP Help
« Reply #6 on: October 04, 2008, 01:20:52 AM »
First, boot from an install CD, go into the Recovery Console, and run "chkdsk /r" (no quotes).  This is a hard disk check routine.
Next, if it will boot to Windows, keep the CD in the drive, and go to start > run > "sfc /scannow" (no quotes).  This is System File Checker, to verify all of your Windows files.
Finally, if it will boot to Windows, I would suggest doing a System Restore to the last known good point.  You will not lose any data since then, just installed programs. 

If it won't boot to Windows, go back to the Recovery Console and run "fixmbr" and then try to boot to Windows.  If no-go, then back to the Recovery Console, run a "fixboot", and try to boot Windows.

If those don't work, attempt to reinstall Windows and choose the "leave current file system intact" option.  It will only rewrite the C:\Windows\ directory, and all of your programs will need to be reinstalled. 
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Offline Taxman

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Re: XP Help
« Reply #7 on: October 14, 2008, 08:18:08 AM »
Thank you for all the replies.  I found out that the problem seems to be in a sector on my hard drive.  At least when I run diagnostics that is what it seems to indicate.  I am a complete idiot at this stuff but it seems to me that this area must contain my boot information.  Could that be correct. 

I have been gone for a bit and just got back.  I will look at it again this evening and see if I can get some more information.  I had some IDE error code 00f0 0024 or something like that. 
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