Windows wont' start

[NiroZ]

Recently, when I logged into windows, it came up with the error window\system32\config\system was corrupted. So I booted the recovery disk and replaced the system folder with an old windows system file I had lying round. Turns out this one has a password on it, and so windows said password mismatch, and rebooted.

so I tried recovering windows, in the hope that it would fix the password mismatch. But it didn't. So I then created a new installation of windows, can used the recovery disk to replace the system folder in that into the my original windows installation. That fixed the password problem, but now windows just shows the loading screen, and then the screen goes blank.

Help?

[IcemanND]

Not sure if it will help now or not. Your original issue with the windws\system32\config\system being corrupted is a registry issue. Easily fixed if you have not turned off system restore.

You can do this from the XP recovery console, but it is easier from BartPE with some form of file explorer installed.

Boot from BartPE, launch preferred file explorer.

browse to c:\windows\system32\config

create new directory called BACKUP

copy files from current folder (CONFIG) to newly created BACKUP folder.

Delete:

default

SAM

SECURITY

software

system

Open second file explorer.

browse to "C:\System Volume Information" (it is a hidden system folder so you may need to change your view to see it)

Inside will be a _restore{*} folder where * is a unique GUID

Open this folder to see all of your available Restore point folders (RPxxx, where xxx is a number)

find the last one created before you had the issue and open that folder, for example RP64, not the date and time stamp on the folder.

Inside RP64 open the snapshot folder.

from this folder copy:

_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SAM

_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SECURITY

_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SOFTWARE

_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SYSTEM

_REGISTRY_USER_.DEFAULT

to C:\windows\system32\config

now in C:\windows\system32\config rename the above files:

_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SAM to SAM

_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SECURITY to SECURITY

_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SOFTWARE to SOFTWARE

_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SYSTEM to SYSTEM

_REGISTRY_USER_.DEFAULT to .default

This step is not mandatory, it depends upon if you had made changes to your system at the time the restore point was created that you want to revert also, I usually don't do this step.

reboot the machine in safe mode and perform a system restore to the restore point you used the backup registry files from.

[NiroZ]

Hmm. This BartPE is supposed to find the c:\ windows installation right?

Or doesn't it matter?

[IcemanND]

BartPE is a bootable (typically) cd based mini XP environment. You can get the builder app at http://nu2.nu/pebuilder/

Any cd that you can boot from and access the installed hard drive will work, you can do it from the XP recovery console also it just requires alot of typing.

[NiroZ]

BartPE is confusing the hell out of me. How would I do this through the recovery console.

[NiroZ]

Disregard that. I reread your instructions, and figured out what to do.

Turns out, there is now a password protection on c: drive even though I copy pasted the new windows installation over the old one, thus I cannot log into it. and without it, I cannot access system volume information. But I can access config/system on the new installation.