Help with fixing a Windows 10 install.

QueBert

Lifer
Jan 6, 2002
22,392
722
126
Something happened where none of the services seem to start (can't do anything to start them manually, tried) and it will randomly reboot, with a shut down message/timer.

I've tried SFC /scannow and DISM with a few different combinations of /'s. I've never done DISM before so it's new to me. Neither worked, I've also tried an repair install with a windows 10 ISO image, but it's not giving me any option besides a fresh install. Is there a way to force an install to do a repair? It doesn't have an optical drive, so it's a windows ISO on a flash drive from a co worker, not sure anything about it beyond that.

System restore isn't working, it errors out. I've exhausted what I know, he won't do a fresh install because this computer has a piece of audio software on it that's very expensive and he can't get it any more any ways.

Now the computer starts up and appears to be working, there's no network so I can't get online to do anything. After usually about 10 minutes a box pops up and it counts down to an unavoidable restart. I've tried safe mode and safe mode with networking, nothing. I thought maybe the registery had gotten corrupt, so I booted to a BART PE disc and tried coping the one from the backup, but nothing.

He won't do a reinstall because of the audio software, I'm out of ideas, but I know where there's a will there's a way. Any suggestions? He's willing to send it somewhere if he has to.
 

VirtualLarry

No Lifer
Aug 25, 2001
56,339
10,044
126
I had a Windows box I worked on once, 7 I think, and some piece of malware had shut off nearly all of the Windows' Services.

I had to pull up BlackViper's list, and set them all back to their default setting manually.
 

mikeymikec

Lifer
May 19, 2011
17,703
9,557
136
OP, have you looked in the event viewer (custom logs > administrative events) for anything helpful? I'd ignore errors about services failing to start and look for other errors and warnings instead.

chkdsk /f /v /r on the Windows partition wouldn't go amiss provided the data is backed up.