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Trying to repair possibly broken boot sector/MBR


Guest Darlyn

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Guest Darlyn

The machine I'm trying dealing with appears to have a damaged boot sector and/or MBR (don't know if they're the same thing). I've come to this conclusion after attempting to mount the drive in Ubuntu with fdisk and finding out that a boot partition table was not present or corrupted. Although it shows up on the boot menu, the hard drive's file system is not being recognized by the motherboard, and after trying to access the drive it resolves to displaying the "DISK BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK" message. Despite this, the blue HP splash screen with the "F11 for System Recovery" option shows up, but pressing F11 unsurprisingly yields nada.

This compounded with the Ubuntu check has led me to the diagnosis of a corrupt boot sector.

The computer had been running Vista Home Premium without issue until a few months before this corrupt boot sector problem. In these months, the OS would run as normally for an hour or so and then crash with a the error of "IRQL not less or equal". The only corrective measures I took at the time were to install the latest video card drivers.

I'm guessing the easiest way to fix the boot sector would be using the installation disk. However, the one I currently have in my possession in not an official installation. It is a customized version that has been optimized to a size of 700MB. The custom install can be found by searching for "Vista Ultimate SP1 Lite". A full, official disk in the process of reaching me, but in the mean time I would like to try using this one.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/927392

The above KB article says to click Repair Computer at the installation window, but no such option is present. The steps I take are the usual selecting of keyboard settings and entering product key, but I am stumped after all that. From that point on I am to choose the drive or partition and an action, but as there is no partition table the installation is listing it as blank/unformated.

At the moment I am running Memtest to check for RAM errors with Ubuntu Live on the machine.

Edited by Darlyn
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try

first : check HDD for bad sectors ( with hiren's boot cd )

second : Restore boot with Vista or 7 Install CD/DVD Disc using "Repair >> command promt" with

these commands

bootrec /fixmbr
bootrec /fixboot

p.s : you can use winpe

Edited by vaska94
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Guest Darlyn

Downloading Hiren's at the moment, should have it burned in about 30 minutes. As for your second suggestion, I have a question: How can I access the repair option? If you recall, I mentioned that this option never presented itself...

Edited by Darlyn
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Downloading Hiren's at the moment, should have it burned in about 30 minutes. As for your second suggestion, I have a question: How can I access the repair option? If you recall, I mentioned that this option never presented itself...

setup-option.jpg

when you boot vista there is Repair option in bottom left :)

then choose command promt :)

(if you use Vista Lite or something similar may don't have repair feature.. )

Edited by fizban2
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try

first : check HDD for bad sectors ( with hiren's boot cd )

second : Restore boot with Vista or 7 Install CD/DVD Disc using "Repair >> command promt" with

these commands

bootrec /fixmbr
bootrec /fixboot

p.s : you can use winpe

Using anything other than advanced trickery may only allow you to boot into Windows, and will leave the Recovery Partition inaccessible. (sic)

Downloading Hiren's at the moment, should have it burned in about 30 minutes. As for your second suggestion, I have a question: How can I access the repair option? If you recall, I mentioned that this option never presented itself...

:no:

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first : check HDD for bad sectors ( with hiren's boot cd )
Downloading Hiren's at the moment, should have it burned in about 30 minutes.

Hiren's boot cd contains non-free (as in, you have to pay the vendor to license it) software, and as such is considered warez (just looking at the list, the first 3 packages are non-free applications - it doesn't get more obvious than that). The very first rule you both agreed to when you signed up for access to the forums forbids discussion of or requesting help in conjunction with the use of warez copies of software.

1.a This is not a warez site! Links/Requests to warez and/or illegal material (e.g., cracks, serials, etc.) will not be tolerated. Discussion of circumventing WGA/activation/timebombs/license restrictions, use of keygens, or any other illegal activity, including, but not limited to, requests for help where pirated software is being used or being discussed, will also not be tolerated. You will be banned without notice.

[both of you banned].

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Also from Forum Rules, for daryln:

4.b Should you be suspended or banned from MSFN, you are not allowed to open a new account to re-obtain the ability to post on the forums. Suspensions and bans are given for a reason and are not up for debate. Users found to be using multiple accounts on the forum, regardless of being suspended/banned or not, will have their accounts immediately banned.
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