Have to fix family friends' Dell, I'm at a loss

[Gurck]

Basically I get a BSOD when trying to boot, no matter whether I try to boot normally, boot into safe mode, or with the system restore option (ie. "last good configuration" or whatnot). The BSOD message is 'unmountable boot volume' - is this the infamous Dell Partition (tm) at work? And if so is there any way around an OS reinstall? If not, is there anything in particular I need to know about reinstalling to this partition? I'm told they tried to install the Sims Online and that it caused this... I have my doubts, but whatever.

 

[bacillus]

Suggest you boot off the Dell XP CD and go into the recovery console by pressing R at the appropriate time. If you are asked for a password do not type anything in the box and just press enter on the keyboard. Once in the recovery console you need to run chkdsk /r
good luck

 

[Pciber]

What comes to mind immediately is to try and repair the MBR - the master boot record... Doesn't quite seem like this is the problem, since you get a BSOD, not a pre-windows error, but hell.. its worth a try, eh?

Stick in your Windows XP install disk, let it load.. then choose the recovery console. I'm not sure what the exact command is (typing in help will give you a list), but i think its FixMBR... it will do its thing, restart, see if it works.

*edit*

lol bac beat me by 10 secs, w/ a better idea

 

[Gurck]

Thank you both, I'll give it a shot. I don't have their windows CD with me (I took their PC only), but I'll hook my floppy drive up to their rig (hopfully it has a connector, it's one of the really cheap boards without even an agp slot, so i'm crossing my fingers) and see if fixing the mbr does anything.

 

[Sacrifice]

You dont want to reinstall the OS because?

If it is loss of data you can always do a parallel installation:
http://www.microsoft.com/resou...n-us/prmc_str_jyof.asp

chkdsk -r and sometimes -fixboot works indeed. Also i have heard from dimension 2400-3000 (without the agp slot) that this happens, personally i think that the games adjust settings or drivers or hardware acceleration but since its hard to recover the OS i have yet to find the cause of this issue.

 

[Gurck]

Argh, it has a floppy controller but no option in the bios to boot from it :| See, littlte crap like this is why Dell sucks, I can't stand it when some tool tries to say they beat DIY :frown: Anyway, I have a knoppix cd but virtually no knowledge of linux - is there a way to manipulate the boot record with knoppix? I'd rather get this done asap, which is why I don't want to have to drop by their house and get the CD, and also why I don't want to reinstall. Further, I believe Dell installs the OS to a partition just big enough for it and so a parallel installation might not work. I can back up any data to my pc if need be, so that's not a concern. And yeah, it's a dimension 2400.

 

[Sacrifice]

Originally posted by: Gurck
Argh, it has a floppy controller but no option in the bios to boot from it :| See, littlte crap like this is why Dell sucks, I can't stand it when some tool tries to say they beat DIY :frown: Anyway, I have a knoppix cd but virtually no knowledge of linux - is there a way to manipulate the boot record with knoppix? I'd rather get this done asap, which is why I don't want to have to drop by their house and get the CD, and also why I don't want to reinstall. Further, I believe Dell installs the OS to a partition just big enough for it and so a parallel installation might not work. I can back up any data to my pc if need be, so that's not a concern.

What system is it? Dimension 2400? Optiplex?

Also try to press f12 during the boot (Dell splash screen), you will get a boot device menu. Maybe the disk is there. Also when the floppy drive is turned off you can always try to reset the Bios: Alt + F, Alt + E, Alt + D, Alt + B. Do this with all leds burning on your keyboard (caps, num, scroll lock).

Far as i know Dell doesnt partition your HDD in several visible partitions, they just make 1 partition on the HDD and then make 1 big partition from it (yes also on the 250gb HDD's) with the OS. They also got a hidden partition on the old systems, which contains their hardware test and on the new systems 2 hidden partitions (1 for image, 1 for hardware tests).

 

[Gunbuster]

Backup data off the drive, format/reload from the dell CD.

 

[Gurck]

Yeah, it's a Dimension 2400. I managed to get it to boot from a floppy, but the drive is ntfs so there isn't much I can do. Fixing the mbr did nothing. There is a second (small - 31mb) partition but it just contains some hardware diagnostic thing. Looking more & more like I'll have to reinstall, ugh

 

[onesNzeros]

You're going to need the Windows CD to reinstall anyway. If you're not itching to reload the OS, why not try the chkdsk /r and fixboot (if needed) first? There's also an option to do a repair install that you can resort to if repairs aren't working or you can access the system restore feature through the recovery console to try rolling it back if the feature hasn't been disabled. No reason to rush to format/reload unless you're looking for an excuse to do it. Just back up any critical data obviously, before you tinker around too much.

You can refer to this knowledgebase article and this one.

EDIT: Actually the system restore probably wouldn't help on this one so scratch that.

 

[Adul]

make a ghost image of the drive
resintall the os without formating

get the data off

format clean install

 

[farmercal]

Argh, it has a floppy controller but no option in the bios to boot from it

Why do you need a floppy drive to boot from a recovery CD? Can't you just go into the BIOS and tell it to boot from CD and then let the recovery CD do the rest?

 

[thirdlegstump]

Bad memory perhaps?

 

[NesuD]

Ok to fix that without the cd here is what you can do. You need to make an XP boot diskette with the chkdsk utility on it. All you need is access to a working win xp machine and Administrative rights on that machine.
1) format a floppy disk
2) In windows explorer select the c: drive and choose tools/folder options, then select the view tab
3) select show hidden files and folders, uncheck hide file extensions for known file types, and uncheck hide protected operating system files. click yes to confirm the changes.
4) From the C:\ copy the following files to the floppy disk:
Boot.ini
Bootsect.dos (if it exists)
ntbootdd.sys (if it exists)
ntdetect.com
ntldr

You now have a bootable xp diskette. Next in windows explorer go to C:\windows\system32 and copy chkdsk.exe to the floppy disk.

Boot from the floppy and hit f8 then select safemode with commandline. you should get a login screen so log in on an administrators account in the commandline run "chkdsk /r c:" from the A: prompt. it will say the volume is in use do you wish to run chkdsk on the next restart. answer yes and restart the computer.

If this doesn't get you there then you will need to get a winxp install cd. if you do that then boot from the cd and enter the repair console. from the repair console run chkdsk /r and the appropriate drive letter for the volume you need to repair.

 

[jmagg]

Run a diagnostic from the harddrive manufacturer.

 

[Gurck]

Thanks NesuD, that did the trick. I should probably know this sort of thing, but I intentionally avoid tech support if possible, as I don't have the patience, and I'd never do stuff like this to my own PC, so it's hard to get experience with it... As an aside, now that the PC will boot, Adaware alone found close to 2,000 instances of spyware, and Spybot chipped in (after Adaware removed most stuff) with about 500 of its own :Q A new nightmare ensues lol, I'll have to get in touch with Schadenfroh As always, I appreciate everyone's help, thanks!

 

[NesuD]

Good to hear it worked for you. Guess those A+ classes were good for something after all. Making that manual xp/2000 bootdisk is actually covered step by step in most A+ OS training curriculums. heres something else that you may find handy. Go to Ultimate boot cd 4 windows. there you can download a couple of packages that you can create an ISO with to make a bootable windows cd that loads a lite version of xp into a ramdrive complete with GUI and network support. the image is chocked full of all kinds of handy utilities including Adaware, CWshredder, Hijack this, and some other antivirus tools like McAfee stinger and trendmicros emergency AV tool all updatable to current definition files via the functioning networking on the cd as well as all the usual windows tools and many others that i haven't used yet.