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(Installed and Restored) Help, can't reinstall XP

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elkinm

Platinum Member
I installed a new motherboard and did a Repair install. Everything went fine except that istead of installing the default XP drivers it kept some of the old sighned drivers which in particular were bad. Like that graphics driver. Tying to remove it and change the settins, something whent wron and the system kept restarting at boot. There was some nlue screen most likely saying that there is a bad file but it was to fast to see.

I tried to do a repair install aggain but when in the setup process at 34 mminutes left and when it says setting up devices, the screen goes blank and the sytem restrts. On rebor or another attemt at a repair install it detects the preivious attemp and only gives the pption to continue or do a clean install. A clean install is not an acceptable option tough.

I would either like to somehow reset all the drivers to default and have window install that way or somehow reomve the update record so windows would attemp a complere Repair install ignoring the old attempt. Also if there is any way to reset all windows files through recovery console, I can do that to. What is crucial is that my installed programs stay intact and my settings stay intact meaning the the registry need ti stay intact.

And if somebody knows how to dissable the auto restart that would also be helpfull.

Thank You
elkinm
 
I think that the file ntoskrnl.exe may be bad and causing the problem as once when I tried booting I recived an error to reinstall this file or another one starting with nto that would load in the begining of loading windows.
 
I renamed the inf folder hoping that it would reinstall all the windows drivers. But when it gets to the actual windows setup with be XP blue screen it prompts to enter the cd with some file, but as for the location is something like system root/..../cdrom drive. Instead of the actual CDrom drive and the mouse and keyboard also do not work. It seems that XP does not install any of the drivers in a repair even if the infs do not exist were they should be. Is there any way to force it to do a complete driver reinstall using the repair install?

Thanks
 
i don't think it's going to work if you replaced the motherboard. I would just backup the data with another computer and do a clean install
 
AFAIK Os's in general don't like motherboard replacements (I think) as it could be a way of copying. Simply ghost the drive to a blank one, and the Os sees it as a different system.

In my opinion, I would add this HD to another computer, copy the registry to a secure location, and any other files you may need, and perform a complete format re-install of your current drive.

Then simply install Xp again, replace/Update the registry and add your files from the other HD and your away
 
I did an install through dos and I no longer have the cdrom request and it just starts instaling. But now once again the system reboots with 34 minutes left as before.

Is there a way to log the error if any that occured before the reboot, or somehow dissable the auto restart feature.


crisp, putting it on another computer is not as easy as it sounds as I don't know anyone with the free space to host it. Anyway I did go and buy a HD just to install and try something on it.
I though about backing up the registry but I don't know which files store it and I can easily import a .reg file, exactly how do I import the registry hives as they are stored on the system? And would there be complication from simply adding an old unmodified registry to a new one, would the old one replace newer entries or only fill in the blanks.

Thanks
 
Another questin. Does anybody remember, isn't there supposed to be a blanck screen at around 34 minutes left while possible installing the graphics adapter or something, There are about 4 blanck screens if I remember correctly. Can anybody who did a recent install or repair confirm this. THe reason I am asking is because there is about a second or half a second in between were the screen goes blank and when I hear the sound of my hard drive reseting for the restart?
 
Whenever I have installed XP, there have been no 'blank screens' as such, just flashes while it changes drivers.

Hooking up to your oher hd is no problem. Transfering files, no problem. Registry, if u never backed it up before, i'm unsure, but the registry files will still be there.

Just out of question, whats is the importance of getting that registry?
 
I decided to install XP on the new hard drive, a 40 GB WD 7200 2mb.

It had no problems with the install. It had a flash or a blank screen for a second at the same time it crashed before. Then had a few more and then continued without problems.

But once I logged into windows for the first time, I right clicked on the desktop to change view settigns when the display froze. A second later the system rebooted similarly to what it did with the other hard drive.
After reboot the creeen would shut down after the logon. I loged into safe mode selected to unistall the graphics driver and reboted into windows. At first it was fine but on several reboots, after loading windows the display whent off every single time.

Any idea what is going on here? Bad card, bad new motherboard, bad CD or something completely different. I can honestly say that I never saw a system not work with seemingly good hardware after a clean install.

Thanks
 
When you did the clean install did you install SP1?
If you did I have an idea what the problem could be. SP1 has it's own default graphics drivers and they may have been picked up during the install and your system isn't happy with them. I have heard that it's best to install your latest graphics drivers before you install Service Pack 1. Maybe someone knows for sure.
 
Well, after my power suply could not power my system anymore, I baought a 400 W Antec. But the Antec was to good or to bad as it burned out my motherboard. When I plugged it into the power plug the fans on my system temoreraly turned on. This isn't that big of a deal but I belive this means that it has current and voltage manegment problems which is what burned my old motherboard. I bought the MSI K7N2 and it ran fine but I was craching and then I started the repair instaling. I then exchanged the 400 W for a 300 W to avoid burnign it out. It did not start with power on. But the voltage from the motehrboard was very low and unstable. I exchanged it for a 350 and it was better but still qite weak. I then bough the 400 Aggain in fear. This one did not have any problems when pluging in the system, but it also did not have readings as high as the first 400. I also bough the Radeon 9000Pro as the problems hve been with video.

Whell my system did not work with the 400 at first but with the 9000 Pro it runs fine.

How normal is it for a video card to go bad all of sudden. Also, the voltages with the new power suplies were always below 5.0 with the exveption of the killer 400 were it was just obove and the video was very stable. So would it be a bad card or one that just needs very good high voltage. Also is it normal for the K7N2 to display low voltages or is it that I have been very ulucky with my power suply selections at the store. I dno't have a multimeter to measure direclty so I would like to get a feel for the motherboard voltages.

I will try re reparing on my old system and se if it works and post the results.

Thanks
 
32 Min and going fine so far. One thing, if I have to get a new video card I would like a slightly better card then a 9000, something like the 9500 or better. And I do want an ATI as it looks better for me and lately using other computers I don't want to risk hurinting my eyes with something else.

Any ideas on a cheep 9500+. I know they are not cheap but they are definetly better then a 9000 for only a reletavly small price premium.

And anybody think that old radeon myght still be salvageble on maybee a weaker less demanding system?

Thanks
 
I still cannot get the keyboard and mouse to work, it installs but when it is time to do something I cannot.

So i tried swaping registry files. I first tried some old registry file from system restore and booted strait to my default logon screen. The problem is that I still have no mouse and keyboard control. The file I changed was system in windows\system32\config
Then I put the system file from the new hard drive to the old one and it booted and I had keyboard and mouse controll leading me to belive that it has something to do with the system file. Maybee the old one is corrup or looking for drivers that were deleated.

The problem is that it gave me a promp saying that while trying to change the password it found out that the password does not match the current password.

On the new install I have no password, on the old one I have two accounts with two passwords. So I was wondering which file(s) store password information and is there any way to reset all passwords so I would not see that error?

Also, is there any way to modify or murge two registry files like the new system and my old complete system to get the settings of the old one and the drivers of the new one?

Thanks
 
The prompt is:
When trying to update a password, this return status indicates that the value provided as the current password is not correct.

I have the system file from the new install and the rest from the old install. I also tried everything from the new install and just software from the old install and they all had the same results.

I found a boot disk to reset and change passwords in win NT, but either it needs something else or it does not work with XP. Is it possible to dissable Syskey and reset or dissable all passwords?

Thanks
 
And one more thing, the error is by lsass.exe. Is there maybee a way to dissable that modyle from checking the password.

Also, where in the registry is the auto logon information stored?

Thanks again
 
You installed Xp on your new HD and you are having booting problems and problems with changing display etc. Have you tried replacing the video card with an old one?

Have you virus scanned your HD?

What is the current state of both Os's on the HDs. Can you boot into the new one still or are you receiving the same error as the old install, if so did it stop before or after you copied across files? If before I would say you have a hardware issue, if after maybe corrupt files.
 
After some tries and clean installs on my old hard drive I fully restored.

I backed up the registry and Documents and Settings to the new hard drive. Deleted the Documents and settigns folder form the old one or XP installs User.ComputerName forlders by default. And I did a clean install on the old drive.
After install I created the same accounts as with the old system and loged into them once to create the documents and settins folders.
Coppied the old software registry hive to the new install. Resulted in a lot of settings and software comming back.

Then I coppied over the old doccuments and settings folder. And this was the amazing part as with the Documents and settins folder all descktop settings were resoted as well as all of icons in their proper positions, my program list was restored in the same order as before and even favorites retained the old order which is good for 500+ entries.

Then I installed updated drivers and everything was normal. The only things that were not resored were some programs that installed filse in the windows\system32 or other windows directory but they can be restored or reinstalled while keeping all settings intact. And he other thing is that I could not restore the passwords form the old system.

I would still like to know how to save and restore all the passwords, but I'm fine with what I have.

Thanks for all your help everyone. And if anyone has similar problems ask away and I might be able to help.
 
Glad you got it sorted eventually. The reason your desktop was returned to the previous setting was because of a file called Desktop.ini which resides in your 'My Documents' folder.
 
Thanks crisp,

I though it might have somethingto do with the desktop.ini's and I did a search for desktop.ini in my documents and in all of documents and settings and found a bunch of 1 KB Desktop.ini files with little info, the ones in my documents showed as 0 KB and were blanck. If this is the desktop setup file, do you know of a way of backing it up and restoring it. I am interested in backing up the basic start menue aperance and settings as well as the icon arrangments.

Thanks again
 
Just make a copy of the file and place where ever you back your files to. Not sure about the strat menu tho.
 
Forgot to add that coppying over the windows\installer folder is imprtant as it stores some uninstall information and some programs like Office XP run their shorcuts and icons for an installer folder, although I can't imagine why.
 
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