jaclaz

Here is a suitable command line (when run from the XP install): Please make sure that the disk is the first one (disk 0 in disk management) \\.\PhysicalDrive0 = source 0 = offset from the beginning of the source 32256= 63*512 length to be copied C:\myfirsttrack.dat = destination jaclaz

Well, I get it with Opera but not with (say) Srware Iron, that lets me access the pages fine . But I will reiterate how a misconfiguration or more generally "issues" can happen to everyone , anytime, whilst crafting a message like: is intentional and plain stupid. jaclaz

Well, not-so-surprisingly, Microsoft decided to use common terms the other way around from the rest of the world (or from elementary logic), JFYI: http://www.multibooters.co.uk/system.html A partition is marked as "boot" or "active" in the MBR, the way MS calls the partitions is simply one of the other ways they manage to make a mess of otherwise quite simple terminology. Easiest would be to make a copy of : 1.first track (first 63 sectors, the GRUB2 will probably occupy only a bunch of them but it costs nothing to save the whole lot), and a copy of relevant files from the various partitions: 2.from the first one: NTLDR, NTDETECT.COM and BOOT.INI 3.from the second one: BOOTMGR and the \boot\BCD folder 4.from the "linux" one, the whole /boot folder The only item that you will actually need to restore after XP re-install/repair will be #1, but having a copy of the other items allows (in case of some unexpected issue) to fix the whole stuff anyway (or to create a "recovery media" as hinted earlier). I hope you understand that since the time you installed any of those OS's you have most probably lost (possibly in a non recoverable way) boot-time access to the HP recovery partition (as hinted before by submix8c) don't you? I would personally use dsfo from the DSFOK toolkit from the booted XP: http://members.ozemail.com.au/~nulifetv/freezip/freeware/ to save those 63 sectors to a file, but you can well use any tool/utility with direct disk access that you may have handy or are more familiar with. jaclaz

Opera is "Opera" until version 12: http://www.opera.com/docs/history/presto/ Anything after, including Opera Next is what we highly specialized technicians define as "half-@§§ed Chrome" : http://www.opera.com/docs/history/ With Opera v12 accessing the site: http://www.windowsbbs.com/ redirects me to: http://www.helpwithwindows.com/WindowsBBS.html Whether it is by design or by mistake it is anyway stupid, and stupidity must not be hidden. BOTH sites are owned by FDMA Media LLC: http://www.fdma-media.com/ which is seemigly a "one man show" by this guy Arie Slob (MS MVP, MCSA, MCDST, MCP, AWN[1]): http://mvp.microsoft.com/en-us/mvp/Arie%20Slob-9155 jaclaz [1] AWN=And What Not, a complimentary title I award personally to anyone with at least two MC* titles.

Which "fantastic" sequence? There is nothing fantastic in it, everything is very, very "normal". There is also a nice graphical version of it: http://www.multibooters.co.uk/multiboot.html jaclaz

Not really (in detecting if it is GRUB or GRUB2) but it does tell us that your "main" bootmanager is the GRUB or GRUB 2, which has only two entries, one of which chainloads your secondary bootmanager (which is the Vista BOOTMGR). But still you can get to the GRUB (or GRUB2) in two ways: GRUB (or GRUB2) code in the MBR + hidden sectors <- please read as "installed to the disk" "normal" MBR and GRUB (or GRUB2) code in the PBR of the active partition <- please read as "installed to the partition"Now, HOW (EXACTLY) is your hard disk partitioned? WHICH is the active partition? Can you find (likely on the "Linux" partition) files core.img and grub.cfg (possibly in a \boot\ folder? <- this would mean that it is GRUB2 alright jaclaz

Also: http://blogs.technet.com/b/askperf/archive/2007/05/08/slow-large-file-copy-issues.aspx Maybe doing a couple tests with a tool like Killcopy: http://www.killprog.com/killcopye.html with different buffer sizes could help in finding a "good" setting to avoid the "general slowdown" when copying (but still it won't "fix" the actual issue) Also MS Richcopy might be worth a try: http://blogs.technet.com/b/keithcombs/archive/2009/03/22/richcopy-bulk-file-copy-tool-released-get-it-here.aspx jaclaz

Naaah: my little (and possibly bad ) influence has been eradicated from it . jaclaz

JorgeA You seemingly miss some background. A MBR is made of three main parts: CODE Disk Signature (only on NT based systems) (DATA) Partition Table (DATA)A "normal" MBR has additionally these two characteristics: it is 512 bytes long (i.e. it fits entirely in the first sector) its only scope is to chainload the first sector (PBR) of the Primary partition marked as actiive in the partition table.Booting sequence for a "normal" MBR: BIOS->MBR->PBR of Active Primary partition->loader or system file->OS In XP: BIOS->MBR->PBR of Active Primary partition->NTLDR->BOOT.INI choices->NTDETECT.COM-> XP OS In Vista: BIOS->MBR->PBR of Active Primary partition->BOOTMGR->\boot\BCD choices->WINLOAD.EXE-> Vista OS A Linux behaves differently. The GRUB or GRUB2 can be installed BOTH to the MBR (but in this case it will take more than the first sector) or to the Volume/Partition (PBR). IF the GRUB is installed to the MBR, it will look for it's own files, and then access it's configuration file (either menu.lst or grub.cfg) where the "choices" are. IF the GRUB is installed to the PBR, the MBR may remain a "normal" one, still only chainloading the PBR of the active partition, which will then load GRUB. We have to understand if your MAIN bootmanager is currently the Vista BOOTMGR or either GRUB or GRUB2, and how EXACTLY they are set. TESTDISK (as well as other data recovery oriented tools) will only care about the partition table of a MBR (completely ignoring both the code and the disk signature). Of course any install will NOT change the partition table (nor the Disk Signature, unless it is empty or having a collision with another disk). The XP install will change the CODE of the MBR, replacing it with a "normal" MBR simply chainloading the PBR of the active primary partition. It will also change the CODE in the PBR writing one that will load NTLDR. It will "keep" the contents of BOOT.INI. But if you installed those three Operating Systems in that order, the Vista install will have: replaced the MBR with some slighly different code (but that still chainloads the PBR of the active partition)replaced the PBR code with one loading BOOTMGRadded to the \boot\BCD an entry corresponding to the one(s) you had before in BOOT.INIThe point is then which bootmanager Netrunner uses and HOW EXACTLY it was installed. It could have been installed at least in two ways: to the MBR (and hidden sectors) and become the "main" bootmanager to the PBR (of another partition dedicated to the Linux OS) and added as an entry to the \boot\BCDjaclaz

This is starting to be interesting , believe it or not I was thinking exactly at that good ol' toy when I saw Real Steel first time. But you have it wrong. That was old design, it was simple, it was sturdy, mechanical and it worked. If you would make a new one would have: touch screen and gestures interfaceWi-Fi or anyway wireless connectionAndroid or Java (or both)need to be connected to the Internetno user replaceable batteries (you would need to take it to service to replace them)jaclaz

A "normal" install of any MS system will always try to (and usually succeed ) "take control" of the booting sequence. Particularly an XP setup is made of 2 steps, the first one where the $WIN_NT$.~BT and $WIN_NT$.~LS are created on a hard disk volume and the second where files from it are actually booted from. The usual procedure is: fully understand your current boot sequence save/backup, etc. install the Windows XP restore the previous situationIf you installed Netrunner, it is likely to be using either GRUB (the real. good ol' thing that the good Linux guy senselessly now call "GRUB legacy") or GRUB2 (the new thing that the good Linux guys senselessly now call GRUB, thus creating a lot of confusions/misunderstindings). Procedure to restore/reinstall the one or the other is different, most probably Netrunner installer/.iso does have a "repair" provision, point is that it may not find your old configuration file (menu.lst or grub.cfg) and find only the just reinstalled XP, so that the result will be a dual boot XP/Netrunner and Vista will be inaccessible/unbootable. I would personally make an "external" media (like a USB stick or a floppy, or even a CD) with grub4dos, NTLDR, NTDETECT.COM, BOOT.INI, BOOTMGR and /boot/BCD capable of booting all three systems as they are now, to be on the "safe side" and reinstall the XP only after you have tested and verified working this solution (BTW, I would have made this anyway, even if no reinstall of XP is foreseen/foreseeable). jaclaz

I might add that it is not the first time that I see posts/threads where - in the end - it is a "mismatch", like "retail key" used for OEM disc, or OEM sticker key not valid for supplied media, etc. The "casual" mentioning of "Dell" may be another good sign of possible issues (for whatever reasons both Dell hardware and Dell originated discs have been a PITA for almost anything that works otherwise everywhere else). A quick check in PID string may help to understand if the issue is a mismatch: http://wiki.lunarsoft.net/wiki/Product_IDs see also the note about reported issues with CD labels. And/or check for the screenshots of different version (when you are asked for the key): http://www.thetechguide.com/misc/winxp.html jaclaz

Still, this is a very unofficial way: http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/163751-windows-update-trouble/?p=1048617 Possibly the "more official" method summed up by submix8c here: http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/163751-windows-update-trouble/?p=1064521 will do as well, without needing to download from mediafire a file from a "stranger" (mind you, the file is "OK" , and - X - is a known and highly reputed member for us that know him since a looong time, but he may appear not like that to a new member of the Forum ). jaclaz

@Balconybar Make sure that you have selected "view installed updates" http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/windows-vista-updates-and-extras/ jaclaz

OT, but not much, this site: http://www.windowsbbs.com/ Gets this if accessed from Opera: It's starting to seem more like a "New Highway, no European cars allowed, sorry" or "Due to abuses by taxi drivers no yellow cars allowed to enter the garage"... jaclaz

@Charlotte Sure , and having (say) a Seagate hard disk hardware tester would be even better to test a Seagate disk drive and make sure it has no issues . Your approach is very good , the point was trying to do something with the least effort, or with a simpler approach first, jaclaz

Yep , what I wonder is if *somewhere* (not necessarily in the keys I posted) there is a "simple answer" through the Registry to add the feature. Ctrl+Alt+End used to work only if Fast User switching was disabled. jaclaz

T. TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT (you should have got the idea by now ) jaclaz

Ideally if mankind evolutes enough to create such robots it would be mature enough to make wars unneeded. A dispute could be settled by flippism or even through a robot fight, but more like "Real Steel": http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0433035/ than those more catastrophic Sci-Fi examples. jaclaz

Under XP, enabling the thingy was possible even without Classic Shell: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/303070/en-us Does the Ctrl+Alt+End key work not anymore? http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2006/10/20/849575.aspx I suspect that one way or the other, a Registry key is involved (or can be used as a workaround) for the missing feature, though I have NOT at all clear the "way of working", see: http://www.planet-europe.fr/docs/support/Performances-Serveur/Most%20Important%20Registry%20Keys%20for%20Terminal%20Services.pdf Somehow OT, but still related, this thingy here seems like nice: http://www.donkz.nl/ jaclaz

Posting just to make joyvalle aware I edited previous post. jaclaz

Yep, it is correct , but you will need to skip 63 sectors. LBA starts with 0, so it equates to say "sectors before", i.e. sector LBA 0 will have 0 sectors before, and you skip 0 sectors, LBA 63 means that it has 63 sectors before and you skip 63 sectors. The issue is that the result of sector 62 is "terrible" The sector is filled with 0x54's (which is BTW a "queer" hex value), normally it is filled with 00's. Let's seee if sector 63 actual contains the valid data. A "normal" NTFS filesystem created under XP and earlier will have the $MFT starting at LCN 786432 and have an 8 sectors (4096 bytes) Cluster size. Hence sector 786432*8+63=6291456+63=6291519 should be the beginning of the $MFT. Use *any* hex/disk editor to inspect sector LBA 6291519 and see if it starts (first few bytes) with "FILE0" or "FILE*". Maybe better, get DMDE from here (though there is also a command line Linux Version, do use the Windows one with which I am more familiar): http://dmde.com/ (get the 2.6.0 for the moment) You can use it to make the dd-like or "forensic sound" disk copy too, if you did not manage to make one through Clonezilla: http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/170392-how-to-recover-accidentaly-deleted-partitionfiles/page-2#entry1061689 Then follow this set of instructions: http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/170392-how-to-recover-accidentaly-deleted-partitionfiles/?p=1061113 and see if it can find the $MFT. jaclaz

Speaking of taking things too seriously! That job ad! "Experience in related field" Actually at least two (2) years of it, the tough part probably being the bold parts (I am quoting the whole of it in case it will disappear from the source site): The employer must either have an obsession for replacing light bulbs or they use a low-quality make/brand.... Just in case: http://www.cs.umd.edu/~gasarch/HUMOR/lightbulb.html http://funny2.com/bulb.htm jaclaz

Trip, you are taking it far too seriously. I was just joking, in these times of Snowden revelations and NSA related talks the accent is to the fact that the mentioned firm, that has been involved with making Police, Government, Military and more generally "Forensics" and "Intelligence" software since years (and besides "sponsors" the excellent Autopsy Free/Open Source tool ) is "clearly" and "publicly" (as opposed to "secretly" or "undercover") recruiting people for what cannot but be a new "secret" software of some kind.... Just for the record the TS/SCI: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._security_clearance_terms http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_Scope_Background_Investigation has NOTHING to do with qualification of any kind (academic or work experience) it is just the result of a very accurate check of your past, you might need one even to become a janitor : http://www.clearancejobs.com/jobs/1787004/janitor-with-active-ts-sci-clearance jaclaz

Good. The disk drive seems like working fine: The: is good, it means that you have a single partition on it, I would presume NTFS, created under XP or earlier. Can you confirm this is the case? So I need a dd copy of: sector LBA 0 (MBR) sector LBA 63 (VBR) Compress the two tresulting sectors into a .zip file and attach it or upload it somewhere and provide a link to it. In TESTDISK (still making a log) can you try "going forward" and see if it finds a partition/filesystem? Follow this: http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk_Step_By_Step and do a "Quick Search". jaclaz