xp registry_error at boot

Working on a XP Pro Dell 8300. Client tells me that her daughter was downloading something from the web when machine shut down. Now when you turn machine on and the splash screen comes up it then comes up with blue screen of death with error "registry_error" then it starts writing a memory dump to the drive then attempts to reboot.

When I attach drive to another machine and go into explorer and try to access the drive so I can back it up my system goes into a slow motion recognization of the drive and then finally comes up and says "Drive x is not formatted do you want to format now ". My machine also is XP Pro.

I think I know the answer but would like someone else to tell me I'm wrong and there is a fix.

Thanks.

 

One additional comment. When I boot up in safe mode it ends up going into the same blue screen of death with the same message and same memory dump to drive.

 

Have you tried the recovery console and a fixmbr?

 

Newt

Have tried that but is asking for administrator password. Client says she doesnt have a password so cant get to console to try chkdsk or fixmbr.

This is XP Pro so what will the ASR do ??? Will it remove the data that I'm trying to save ???

 

Newt

Was able to boot to the console by using w2k pro cd found that tip on the web and it worked. chkdsk came back with no errors to report, did fixmbr and still get same problem when booting up. Also ran Maxtor diagnostics on drive and it reports drive in good shape, ran PC Certify diags on h.d. and it reported multiple errors when doing the read function it also reported no errors with the memory. Ran in a loop function.

Any ideas would be appreciated.

 

Newt

Is it possible to reinstall XP to a different folder and retain the data for retrieval once reinstall ???

 

Did you try leaving the admin password blank, or typing in "Admin" ? ASR is great, but has to be set up ahead of time.

A Repair Install might save the data, but if the hard drive is broken, recovery of the data is the best you can hope for. Ask one of the Mods to put this in Hardware.

Johanna

 

Johanna

Well I guess ASR is out of the question cuz it wasnt done a head of time so no floppy to work with. Question can I create a floppy for this function for one of my other machines ??? Again will this destroy the data thats on the machine that I NEED to try my best to recover ???

Yes, I did try admin, administrator, blank password and a few others to no avail.

Right now because Maxtor diags said there were no physical problems with the drive I am running under the assumption that just the op system got trashed.

 

Wanted to thank all for the information you shared. I reinstalled to a XP different folder and it looks like I will be able to recover clients data then I will rebuild from scratch.

Thanks again.

 

Unless the drive is bad or the MBR is trashed (which the fixmbr would correct) you can nearly always do just what you did.

With our servers we usually set up a small partition that will just hold a bare-bones 2nd copy of the OS and use that if needed for disaster recovery. The write-up says NT but it includes all from NT4 thru 2003.

Something you might want to investigate now while there is no urgency is a utility from www.sysinternals.com that will allow remote access to a drive that is basically 'dead' so that you can get the needed data from it. Don't need it often but it's a real lifesaver when you do.

 

Another reason for Backing Up on a regular basis... Maybe talk your client into an external harddrive? If you are going to reinstall, you might want to set up ASR for your client, too.

Glad you got it fixed, and thanks for posting back.

Johanna

 

Newt and Johanna

Newt I will take a look at the link you furnished and keep for the future. Johanna usually when I get these systems its after the machines have died for whatever reason. You'd be surprised at how many people have burners and never use them to back up their data. The kids use them for music stuff but not to back up the things they cant afford to loose. I will setup the ASR and hopefully they will never need to use it but nice if its needed. I always give them a 2 cent tour of data backup and usually configure the burner to back up the individuals profile minus the things that arent needed in those profiles.

Again thanks all. System is back up and running just finishing off downloading a spyware and adware programs and setting them up with a firewall just to make them as safe as possible.