Re: OT: WinXP boot problems.
On 10/2/2012 11:22 AM, John Sessoms wrote: From: Doug Franklin On 2012-10-02 1:32, P. J. Alling wrote: OK I'm at my wits end on this. After installing an update to my Laptop the machine won't boot. Well not quite anyway. It goes through post and then stops at a blinking curser on a blank black screen. So I built a slipstream recovery disk with the proper drivers on it and then attempted all manner of recovery. I rebuilt boot.ini. Still no boot. I rebuilt the boot sector, no boot. I rewrote the mbr, no boot. I did a full repair of windows. (Did I mention the drive tests out as just ducky?), no boot. I reinstalled windows preserving drivers, laptop restarts no boot. Now here's the salient issue. I'm using it right now. On startup the laptop gives the option for a one time boot menu, which includes all attached bootable devices, including the internal harddrive. Just for laughs selected the that drive and it boots! WTF. Now I know this isn't a tech forum but heck, I've tried all of the ones I usually frequent and no one has a solution to this. This is causing me to tear out what's left of my hair and I don't want to look like Cotty. Hmm, that's an odd one, dude. Did you use Windows to try to fix up the MBR, partition boot record, etc.? If so, maybe try it again with a Linux distribution geared to system recovery? I have to wonder if one or more of those tools is assuming that it knows better than you and not actually writing a new loader. It almost sounds like a UEFI boot where the crypto certificates have gotten corrupted. I think there used to be an option where you can step through loading the drivers that prompts you for each one & you have to press 'Y' for it to load. Tedious, but if it hangs at a particular driver, you know which one is giving the problem. I haven't used it in a long time, so I don't know if it's still in the boot menu. I knew about that it was my next step but the damned thing fixed itself. Still not entirely sure what was wrong. -- Don't lose heart, they might want to cut it out, and they'll want to avoid a lengthly search. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: OT: WinXP boot problems.
From: Doug Franklin On 2012-10-02 1:32, P. J. Alling wrote: OK I'm at my wits end on this. After installing an update to my Laptop the machine won't boot. Well not quite anyway. It goes through post and then stops at a blinking curser on a blank black screen. So I built a slipstream recovery disk with the proper drivers on it and then attempted all manner of recovery. I rebuilt boot.ini. Still no boot. I rebuilt the boot sector, no boot. I rewrote the mbr, no boot. I did a full repair of windows. (Did I mention the drive tests out as just ducky?), no boot. I reinstalled windows preserving drivers, laptop restarts no boot. Now here's the salient issue. I'm using it right now. On startup the laptop gives the option for a one time boot menu, which includes all attached bootable devices, including the internal harddrive. Just for laughs selected the that drive and it boots! WTF. Now I know this isn't a tech forum but heck, I've tried all of the ones I usually frequent and no one has a solution to this. This is causing me to tear out what's left of my hair and I don't want to look like Cotty. Hmm, that's an odd one, dude. Did you use Windows to try to fix up the MBR, partition boot record, etc.? If so, maybe try it again with a Linux distribution geared to system recovery? I have to wonder if one or more of those tools is assuming that it knows better than you and not actually writing a new loader. It almost sounds like a UEFI boot where the crypto certificates have gotten corrupted. I think there used to be an option where you can step through loading the drivers that prompts you for each one & you have to press 'Y' for it to load. Tedious, but if it hangs at a particular driver, you know which one is giving the problem. I haven't used it in a long time, so I don't know if it's still in the boot menu. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
OT: WinXP boot problems.
PJ's nightmare... On startup the laptop gives the option for a one time boot menu, which includes all attached bootable devices, including the internal harddrive. Just for laughs selected the that drive and it boots! WTF. Matthew is probably right, and got there faster, just saw his post Have you checked in the BIOS that the default boot order is correct (i.e., has the hard drive first)? Also, I've had badly-behaved USB devices prevent booting, so if you have anything attached, try removing it. (That probably even includes SD cards in an internal reader.) Possible explanation indeed - based on the boot menu success - the cpu was trying to boot a device diff than your hard drive, an incapable one. By any chance you had a non-bootable usb or memory card in the pc yesterday? Once I used my Linux pendrive on someone's pc and forgot to point the first boot to the hard drive later - he called me in the middle of night... Got there and removed his pendrive, boot success, my fault it was in restoring bios settings. For the record, I don't think science explains all - if all else fails, get some salt in a crystal something, place it in the sunlight, place it nearby - then make soft noises with a silver bell and pray... );-) -- luiz felipe luiz.felipe at luizfelipe.fot.br -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: OT: WinXP boot problems.
On Tue, Oct 2, 2012 at 1:32 AM, P. J. Alling wrote: > On startup the laptop gives the option for a one time boot > menu, which includes all attached bootable devices, including the internal > harddrive. Just for laughs selected the that drive and it boots! WTF. Have you checked in the BIOS that the default boot order is correct (i.e., has the hard drive first)? Also, I've had badly-behaved USB devices prevent booting, so if you have anything attached, try removing it. (That probably even includes SD cards in an internal reader.) -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: OT: WinXP boot problems.
On 10/2/2012 1:48 AM, Doug Franklin wrote: On 2012-10-02 1:32, P. J. Alling wrote: OK I'm at my wits end on this. After installing an update to my Laptop the machine won't boot. Well not quite anyway. It goes through post and then stops at a blinking curser on a blank black screen. So I built a slipstream recovery disk with the proper drivers on it and then attempted all manner of recovery. I rebuilt boot.ini. Still no boot. I rebuilt the boot sector, no boot. I rewrote the mbr, no boot. I did a full repair of windows. (Did I mention the drive tests out as just ducky?), no boot. I reinstalled windows preserving drivers, laptop restarts no boot. Now here's the salient issue. I'm using it right now. On startup the laptop gives the option for a one time boot menu, which includes all attached bootable devices, including the internal harddrive. Just for laughs selected the that drive and it boots! WTF. Now I know this isn't a tech forum but heck, I've tried all of the ones I usually frequent and no one has a solution to this. This is causing me to tear out what's left of my hair and I don't want to look like Cotty. Hmm, that's an odd one, dude. Did you use Windows to try to fix up the MBR, partition boot record, etc.? If so, maybe try it again with a Linux distribution geared to system recovery? I have to wonder if one or more of those tools is assuming that it knows better than you and not actually writing a new loader. It almost sounds like a UEFI boot where the crypto certificates have gotten corrupted. Well I got tired walked the dog, (three in the morning here), and damn it boots! I don't know what changed, I don't know how it changed. When things just seem to fix themselves it worries me. Oh well at least it looks like I'll get the project I'm doing for Thursday finished. -- Don't lose heart, they might want to cut it out, and they'll want to avoid a lengthly search. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: OT: WinXP boot problems.
On 2012-10-02 1:32, P. J. Alling wrote: OK I'm at my wits end on this. After installing an update to my Laptop the machine won't boot. Well not quite anyway. It goes through post and then stops at a blinking curser on a blank black screen. So I built a slipstream recovery disk with the proper drivers on it and then attempted all manner of recovery. I rebuilt boot.ini. Still no boot. I rebuilt the boot sector, no boot. I rewrote the mbr, no boot. I did a full repair of windows. (Did I mention the drive tests out as just ducky?), no boot. I reinstalled windows preserving drivers, laptop restarts no boot. Now here's the salient issue. I'm using it right now. On startup the laptop gives the option for a one time boot menu, which includes all attached bootable devices, including the internal harddrive. Just for laughs selected the that drive and it boots! WTF. Now I know this isn't a tech forum but heck, I've tried all of the ones I usually frequent and no one has a solution to this. This is causing me to tear out what's left of my hair and I don't want to look like Cotty. Hmm, that's an odd one, dude. Did you use Windows to try to fix up the MBR, partition boot record, etc.? If so, maybe try it again with a Linux distribution geared to system recovery? I have to wonder if one or more of those tools is assuming that it knows better than you and not actually writing a new loader. It almost sounds like a UEFI boot where the crypto certificates have gotten corrupted. -- Doug "Lefty" Franklin NutDriver Racing http://NutDriver.org Facebook "NutDriver Racing" Sponsored by Murphy -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
OT: WinXP boot problems.
OK I'm at my wits end on this. After installing an update to my Laptop the machine won't boot. Well not quite anyway. It goes through post and then stops at a blinking curser on a blank black screen. So I built a slipstream recovery disk with the proper drivers on it and then attempted all manner of recovery. I rebuilt boot.ini. Still no boot. I rebuilt the boot sector, no boot. I rewrote the mbr, no boot. I did a full repair of windows. (Did I mention the drive tests out as just ducky?), no boot. I reinstalled windows preserving drivers, laptop restarts no boot. Now here's the salient issue. I'm using it right now. On startup the laptop gives the option for a one time boot menu, which includes all attached bootable devices, including the internal harddrive. Just for laughs selected the that drive and it boots! WTF. Now I know this isn't a tech forum but heck, I've tried all of the ones I usually frequent and no one has a solution to this. This is causing me to tear out what's left of my hair and I don't want to look like Cotty. -- Don't lose heart, they might want to cut it out, and they'll want to avoid a lengthly search. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
