HAL.DLL missing after overclock

[faye]

Dear all,

I attempted to overclock to 2.6 yesterday, then windows coulding bootup.
It says "<rootdirectory>\windows\system32\hal.dll is either missing or corrupted, please re-install" something like this..

when i put it back at stock clock, it remains, however when i use Windows XP boot disc, then no problem, no i will have to use boot disc to boot up everytime..
How can i fix it? I have tried to find the file(hal.dll) under \windows\system32 and it is there. Boot.ini seems working perfectly...

so what is going on? next time when i install windows xp, should i do it after i use the new clock rate?

 

[Smilin]

There are 3 main causes that may cause this error:
1 - Corrupted disk
2 - boot.ini is damaged or missing
3 - hal.dll is actually damaged or missing

==== Case 1 =============
1. Boot into the recovery console.
2. Run "chkdsk /p". to check for errors.
3. If errors are found then run "chkdsk /r"
3. Restart to see if the issue is resolved.
========================

==== Case 2 ==============
1. Boot into the recovery console.
2. Run "bootcfg /rebuild".
You will receive a message similar to this:
Total Identified Windows Installs: 1
[1] C:\Windows
Add installation to boot list? (Yes, No, All)
3. Press "y" then press "Enter"
4. When "Enter Load Identifier" appears type in the name of the operating system
(This name is arbitrary and is just a label for the the found installation) and
press "Enter".
5. When "Enter OS Load options" appears type "/fastdetect" and press "Enter".
6. Exit recovery console to see if issue is resolved
=======================

==== Case 3 ============
To restore hal.dll with the version of the HAL Driver installed during setup,
perform the following steps.

1. Boot to the Recovery Console by either: - running the XP setup from the CD and
selecting the repair option. - if the Recovery Console has been installed, select
it from the OS Choices menu.
2. On you have booted to the Recovery Console, you will be at the \%WINDIR%\ folder
(where %WINDIR% is the directory in which Windows XP has been installed). Change
directory to the \%WINDIR%\Repair folder by typing "cd repair" and hitting Enter.

3. From the \%WINDIR%\Repair folder, view the setup.log file by typing in "more
setup.log" and hitting enter.
4. Locate the line that reads \WINDOWS\system32\hal.dll = "********","#####" (
where the ******** indicate the HAL driver file that was installed) example:
\WINDOWS\system32\hal.dll = "halacpi.dll","1a769" (where halacpi.dll is the HAL
driver file) Note: the name of the compressed file in the Windows XP Installation
files will be same except with the extension of "dl_" instead of "dll". Example:
"halacpi.dl_" for "halacpi.dll"
5. Press ESC to get back to the Recovery Console Command Prompt
6. Expand the file from the Windows XP CD by typing in the following: expand
d:\i386\(name of compressed driver file) c:\windows\system32 Example: expand
d:\i386\halacpi.dl_ c:\windows\system32
7. Change directory to the \%WINDIR%\System32 folder by typing in "cd
\%WINDIR%\system32" and hitting Enter.
8. Rename the expanded file to "hal.dll" by typing in "ren (name of driver file)
hal.dll" and hitting Enter. Example: "ren halacpi.dll hal.dll" 9. Restart the
system.

 

[faye]

i will try that,
but the bad news is, today i've tried to reinstall windows.

it happens again when it first boot up

but very wierd, when i put in the boot CD(win xp), it asks if i want to boot up using the cd, if so press any key(something like that), but i didn't hit any buttons, i just let it "..." pass, then windows will bootup perfectly...(perfectly no perfectly, i can't have sounds)

sigh.. did i damage the drive or anything after i overclock?

 

[Smilin]

Try the chkdsk in step 1.

The CD behavior does stink of a hardware issue. There is nothing in the software portion of the boot sequence that cares if a CD was in the drive or not. You could try resetting bios to defaults then setting everything (including boot sequence) again.

You may have damaged the filesystem somehow but the drive should be ok. As for your drive controller..depends how you overclocked but you could certainly blow it.



I'll say this then leave the topic alone:
The peers I work with are all top-of-the-foodchain support escalation engineers including guys that do actual live debugging. We are all performance junkies but not a one of us overclocks. If the hardware was meant to do that it would have been released that way. Hardware damage aside, it only takes one bitflip to destroy the stability of an OS. A "stable" overclocked system is typically an illusion.

 

[wpshooter]

Originally posted by: Smilin


I'll say this then leave the topic alone:
The peers I work with are all top-of-the-foodchain support escalation engineers including guys that do actual live debugging. We are all performance junkies but not a one of us overclocks. If the hardware was meant to do that it would have been released that way. Hardware damage aside, it only takes one bitflip to destroy the stability of an OS. A "stable" overclocked system is typically an illusion.

I absolutely agree, don't O/C.

Now let's duck our heads, Smilin.

 

[Markbnj]

Originally posted by: wpshooter

Originally posted by: Smilin


I'll say this then leave the topic alone:
The peers I work with are all top-of-the-foodchain support escalation engineers including guys that do actual live debugging. We are all performance junkies but not a one of us overclocks. If the hardware was meant to do that it would have been released that way. Hardware damage aside, it only takes one bitflip to destroy the stability of an OS. A "stable" overclocked system is typically an illusion.

I absolutely agree, don't O/C.

Now let's duck our heads, Smilin.

Yeah, you might get flamed, but it's more true than not. I don't necessarily agree that every "stable" overclocked system is an illusion. Processors aren't stable at a single speed. They are stable up to some speed where they are not, and that may or may not be the rated speed. Everyone is familiar with chip binning, and there have been far too many long-term successes over the years for blanket statements to be very useful.

Also, yes, one bit flip can very easily render an operating system unusable. But I have had Windows puke on startup many times when overclocking, and haven't had that happen. Why? There are lots of fairly complicated software-releated reasons for that, but probability alone is an important factor. Bottom line: out of 8 to 16 billion bits of ram in the average system a random bitflip has to hit an o/s related data structure that is persistent, and is written to disk before the current session is terminated. It's like trying to drop a dart from a hot air balloon into a bucket on the ground.

This is _vastly_ oversimplified, not least of all because the bitflips are more likely to occur where ram is being read/written by an active process, but the point is valid. The "space" in the machine is huge and much of it can be walked all over without doing any permanent damage.

That said, you're still right: it's a risk.

 

[Smilin]

I was really referring more to bitflips within the CPU itself. XOR EAX,EAX failing to zero for instance. You say you have Windows failing at boot but not due to a bitflip. What makes you think that? Did you have a debugger hooked to the box at the time it went down?

I did not intend to get into a big discussion on the topic. I just wanted to be sure the guy who quite possibly blew up his system due to overclocking realizes it might not be the best idea.

I'm not the slightest bit worried about someone flaming me on this topic.


Faye:
What was the result of the chkdsk /p ?
What happens if you boot with just your hard drive and no other storage devices attached?
If not good, move to a different controller and/or channel and see what happens.

 

[faye]

oh, i reinstalled windows again...
now i set my bios as default... no overclock this time,
then now everything runs very smooth...

when i use the "chkdsk/f" in dos prompt, it will ask me if i want to do it on the next startup.

 

[Markbnj]

I was really referring more to bitflips within the CPU itself. XOR EAX,EAX failing to zero for instance. You say you have Windows failing at boot but not due to a bitflip. What makes you think that? Did you have a debugger hooked to the box at the time it went down?

Well, I never said it wasn't due to a corrupted file (i.e. bitflip). The fact is that when Windows failed while I was o/c-ing I would have no idea why... just like everyone else .

Bitflips within the CPU, for example in the EAX register you reference, can certainly bring a process down, and will often cause erroneous behavior, but they can't corrupt the operating system (beyond farking up the current session) unless the offending crud is written to disk and reloaded the next time the O/S (or related process) runs.

 

[Smilin]

Originally posted by: faye
oh, i reinstalled windows again...
now i set my bios as default... no overclock this time,
then now everything runs very smooth...

when i use the "chkdsk/f" in dos prompt, it will ask me if i want to do it on the next startup.

It sounds like you are ok now Faye.


With the chkdsk I was assuming you could no longer boot and were running it from the recovery console with the /P switch. If you are running it from a booted OS with the /F switch, yea it will have to reboot to touch the volume. The results will be recorded in a Winlogon event in your event logs.


Markbnj: We're just not on the same page If you take an overclocked system and analyze every application or OS failure down to the exact root cause you are going to be quite surprised at how much trouble overclocking can create. Most folks don't have the tools or gumption to do this and chock it up as some bad apps/drivers or otherwise dismiss it. I myself can't stand crashes - not even one. Others may not care about a few here and there I guess.

 

[xtknight]

I've had this happen to me and the chkdsk /r fixed it well. My hard disk had been corrupted but chkdsk recovered every piece of it as far as I could tell. Autopsy->SATA bus was not locked. I haven't overclocked since. When it says HAL is missing usually something a lot worse has happened than just HAL itself being deleted.

 

[Markbnj]

Markbnj: We're just not on the same page If you take an overclocked system and analyze every application or OS failure down to the exact root cause you are going to be quite surprised at how much trouble overclocking can create. Most folks don't have the tools or gumption to do this and chock it up as some bad apps/drivers or otherwise dismiss it. I myself can't stand crashes - not even one. Others may not care about a few here and there I guess.

How many application and operating system failures are you used to seeing? I have an overclocked system, and it has been crash-free for six months under heavy use.

I'm not debating the complexities of determing the root cause of a particular failure. Gumption aside, very few people have the tools installed to do that, even software engineers like myself. You'd need checked versions of the operating system and apps, the necessary symbol files, and a hardware breakpoint debugger like ICE.

Even with all of those tools, how would you know whether a particular bit was set wrong due to an overclocking failure, or a logic error? The answer is that you wouldn't. Even with access to the complete stack trace you aren't going to have a journal of every instruction and its results.

In any case, the only point I was trying to make was that in order for the effects of an overclocking-related error to be persistent across a reboot it has to effect some structure that is written to disk and then reloaded on the next session. Overall such occurences are rare.