OT: Computer question

[lord_verminaard at yahoo.com (Brendan Doyle)]

Could be a handful of problems.  First, (easiest one first)
Boot off a Windows XP CD, and hit "r" when asked if you want to go to the recovery console.  Once in, type: CHKDSK /R and hit enter.  Wait until it finishes, (can sometimes take 30 minutes or more) remove the CD and see if it's good.  If not, step 2.

Boot off the XP CD again, go back into the recovery console.
type: expand D:\i386\ntoskrnl.ex_ C:\Windows\system32
This is assuming that "D" is your CD drive and "C" is the hard drive where XP is installed.  Don't forget the space after the ".ex_" and "C".
It might bitch about overwriting a file, hit "Y".
Remove CD, reboot and pray to deity of choice.  If no, proceed to step 3.  (the longest, and least likely solution)

Once again boot off the CD into the recovery console.
Type: bootcfg /rebuild and hit enter.
Answer "yes" to first question about Adding installation to boot list
For the next question type either Windows XP Professional or Windows XP Home (whichever you have)
for the 3rd question, just leave it blank and hit enter.

Remove CD, reboot, and select the first item on the boot menu.  It should boot.  After it has booted, you will have to modify the boot.ini from within Windows.  It's easy.  Right-click "my computer" and select properties.  Hit the "advanced" tab, then click the button for settings next to "startup and recovery".  Under "system startup" click "Edit".   Look for the Default= part, and see if the string after that matches one of the strings under [operating systems].  It should match one of them exactly.  DELETE the string that matches it. Under [Operating Systems] there should be another entry that is a little bit different- copy that different string, the entire thing, it should be similar to this: 
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect and REPLACE the part after "Default=" under [boot loader]  Now, the part under [boot loader] after "Default=" should match the part that is under [Operating Systems], which is the string we created back in the recovery console.  :)  Do a "file" "Save" and all should be good.

Other than that, there is not much to do except decide how important the files you need are.  :P

Good luck!  I just fixed this problem on friday at one of my client sites.

Brendan

----- Original Message ----
From: C Boyko <roccit_53@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: scirocco-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Sunday, November 4, 2007 7:05:40 AM
Subject: OT: Computer question


And you'll have to really dumb down the answer. My son's been having
problems with his XP machine, he tried reinstalling XP ( likely a
 mistake)
and now he has the delightful DOS screen with this endearing message
Windoews could not start because the following file is missing or
 corrupt:
<Windows root>system 32/hal.dll.
Please reinstall a copy of the above file.

The slash should go the other way BTW, couldn't find it on the
 keyborad.
Anyway, what's his best path from here. He has AutoCad files for work
 on
the machine so recovering it would be better than formatting. Thanks, I
have a vested interest in his machine working because there will be
increasing pressure for me to let him use mine and I just do not want
 to do
that. He can only stand my old Dell for so long, and no way he's using
 my
IBM.
Cathy


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