Win XP registry error, HELP!!!

[Yamyam]

I'm having some major problems with my WinXP registry. I added two new keys under my drive settings and it won't boot, even in safe mode. I've installed a temporary WinXP on a secondary drive as I try to debug this problem.

I need to find some way to remove the two added keys from my original system's registry. I've searched for "registry" on that drive (from the secondary drive's system bootup) and can't find it. I've run regedit from the new system, but it only sees its own registry. My pre-modifications registry backup mocks me from my original system's desktop folder. I tried to restore it, but I think that would restore it onto my new system's registry. I've also read that restoring it wouldn't help because restoring won't remove newly added keys, it only replaces modified ones that already existed when the backup was made. What I really want to do is, to replace the original system's registry with the original system's pre-modifications backup copy of the registry. I'd also be willing to try restoring from the backup, but I can't figure out how to do that either.

So, am I completely SOL? Please advise ASAP.

 

[AkumaBao]

Tell me you have a backup of some sort of your registry. Choosing "Last Known Good Configuration" didn't work? If it indicates a specific .dll file or something conflicting, just go into the repair mode off the CD, and expand the corrupted files off the CD to replace the ones conflicting.

 

[Wolfsraider]

try installing xp again and choose repair

mike

 

[Yamyam]

Thanks to everyone for the info. I tried "last good configuration".... no good, because the problem was in the registry and not in the drivers. I tried repairing from the install CD... couldn't find any registry tools in repair menu. I wasn't able to restore from my registry backup because Windows only lets you restore on the currently-running copy on Windows... and if my original system was still bootable, I wouldn't need to restore its registry. Anyway, I don't think that would have helped. If the registry-restore function is anything like the "Backup" system management tool, it overwrites backed-up data but doesn't remove newly-added stuff. Frankly, it seems like backing up your registry is a fool's errand... the only time you'll need the backup is when you can't get to it.

So anyway. I looked through MS's knowledge base, and found a good article about how to recover from a corrupted registry that prevents XP from booting. It even made sense after I read it about a dozen times .

Unfortunately, after I removed my corrupt registry and replaced it with a previous good one, XP refused to let me into my system. It couldn't find its activation info anymore, and wouldn't let me into the system so I could update it. It would show me a tantalizing split-second glimpse of my desktop, then revert back to the blue login screen. So I went back to the knowledge base for some more research, but I couldn't find any information about bypassing the product activation (go figure). My computer and I reached a standoff, with me waving my fully-licensed XP disk at the monitor and screaming obscenities while my computer politely waited for my login information so it could tease me with another glimpse of my desktop. I finally gave up, copied my files onto another drive, and reinstalled everything from scratch.

Oh, and this gets even better.... wanna guess why I was futzing around in my registry in the first place? I was trying to work around another XP bug that slows my blazingly-fast 15k SCSI drive down to a 5 Mb/s trickle (which made reinstalling XP take FOREVER.... but I've had just about all the irony that I can handle for today, thanks)

So, boys and girls..... the moral of this story is: don't bother trying to get good performance out of your Windows PC..... just shrug your shoulders, cast your eyes downward, and ask Microsoft "Thank you for the abuse, may I please have some more??"



New question..... would anyone care to donate a recent copy of Linux CD's and a hardware modem to a good cause?