Hi there,
Today, a coworker handed me her husbands Dell Inspiron 8600 notebook which runs Windows XP Home. He said he was having some problems with Windows being really slow, so he called Dell. He said that they told him to delete temporary internet files and some other items. Upon restarting the machine, the notebook would not boot. At this point, Dell sent him a new hard drive and wished him well. (These are the details I heard from my coworker.) Anyway, her husband (the owner of this laptop) just got back from Iraq, and he's got some pictures and stuff on here that he really needs. Below is the error message, and if anyone could help me, I'd appreciate it.
I did search here for this stop error and I understand that it could be a hard drive problem or Windows XP just needs to be reinstalled. I have been told by the husband that the hard drive wasn't acting funny, and other than 'being slow' in Windows, there were no other issues. I have the recovery disc, so reloading Windows isn't the problem (since I also have the new drive Dell shipped him), but rather retreiving his pictures and info, copying that to one of my PCs, and then reloading XP and/or swapping drivers on his laptop.
Anyway, here is what happens:
When you turn the PC on, the black screen appears, asking you to:
Boot into Safe Mode
Boot into Safe Mode with Network Support
Boot into Safe Mode with Command Prompt
Last Known Good Configuration
Start Windows Normally
No matter what option I select, I get the following BSoD which I'm typing as I look at the error on the laptop:
---start---
A problem has been detected and Windows has been shut down to prevent damage to your computer. If this is the first time you've seen this Stop error screen, restart your computer. If this screen apprears again, follow these steps:
Check for viruses on your computer. Remove any newly installed gard drives or hard drive controllers. Check your hard drive to make sure it is properly configured and terminated. Run CHKDSK /F to check for hard drive corruption, and then restart your computer.
Technical Information:
*** STOP: 0x0000007B (0xF8953640, 0xC0000034, 0X00000000, 0x00000000)
---end---
Anything positive I might be able to expect from this? Will a 'repair' of XP work -- will it let me get to his data (pictures) without erasing them? Data recovery is not my speciality, so I'm more full of questions than I am answers at this point. I'm just looking to get to the data and copy it to a PC on my LAN, then reinstall XP on this laptop and swap drives if necessary.
Thanks for any help.
Jeff
by: CorporatePenguinPosted on 2005-03-15 at 10:16:41ID: 13547201
Boot to recovery console and see if you are prompted for the administrator password.
if you get dumped to the c:\ prompt before bieng asked for the local administrator password, do the following:
1) type "dir" and see if you get a message about directory enumeration error
2) if you get the directory enumeration error, run "chkdsk /r" and wait for it to finish. This may take a while. What has happened is that the MFT (master file table) is screwed up and the OS doesn't know where it's files are. Chkdsk will fix this if possible.
If you do get prompted for the administrator password, this is most likely the password that the owner used to login, since this is XP home. If this password doesn't work, try <ESC> then <ENTER>. This enters a blank admin password.
If you can get in and can get to the c:\windows directory, you can swap the registry hives so that the original registry is used to boot. This allows you to get to the OS and copy files.
I'll post this in a minute.