XP Repair Install - Never Been Successful

[goombawaho]

I do PC work all the time and I've tried only 2 repair installs on two vastly different PCs over the years when it was important that the owner KEEP his installed programs. Otherwise I would have just reloaded from scratch.

Anyway, both times, the installation went through, but after the end of the install and reboot of the machine, it never got to the desktop. It just sits there and cranks away. It would boot to desktop in Safe Mode, but never in regular mode. Task Manager doesn't help me to launch explorer. In fact, it says explorer is running. Checked to make sure USERINIT and it's registry entry were present.

Is there anything you can think of that would cause this? I had already scanned for malware with a bootable BART PE CD, so that should NOT be the issue. I also checked the hard drive before proceeding to make sure it was about to die.

I have no faith in repair installs of XP at this point.

 

[edfair]

I have a better percentage, somewhere about 3/4 successful.

In safe mode you can get into the registry and yank out a whole lot of stuff that doesn't apply. Worst case is another repair and best case it that it gets fixed. Anti-virus software would be my first candidate.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[goombawaho]

That's not much of an analysis of what might be causing the problem in a GENERAL sense. Are you trying to say that whatever the startup items are - one or more them is gumming up the works???

I wouldn't think that anything would be starting AFTER the repair install that WASN'T already starting BEFORE the repair install, since a repair install keeps installed programs.

 

[linney]

I'd like to find someone who has used the SFC /Scannow to fix a problem in XP too. I am sure that is a rare occurrence in relation to the number of times that program is run.

It lists lots of "Do's and Don'ts" in the article concerning a repair install.

How to perform an in-place upgrade (reinstallation) of Windows XP

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315341/en-us

 

[goombawaho]

I HAVE fixed quite a few "weird behavior" problems by doing SFC /SCANNOW. And for those times when it didn't fix any "visibly identifiable" problem, I feel it's a great idea to do it after you yank out a bunch of malware from a computer, just to get back where you should be in case the malware messed with windows files.

 

[goombawaho]

The only thing I can think of from reading that is having NOT done this or at least checked it: "If Internet Explorer 7 is installed on your computer, you must uninstall it before you reinstall Windows XP."

I used an SP3 integrated CD last time, so if XP HAD been at SP3 or SP2, it should have been okay.

 

[BadBigBen]

out of 10 times that I have done an "Inplace Upgrade Install" of XP, only two did not work right, and that was due to me using a XP SP1 CD on an SP2 or SP3 install, once I slipped streamed it, I again did that an it worked...

the second time, it turned out to be a driver issue, where the driver became wacked, installing the drivers worked for me that time, e.g. ChipSet and Massstorage drivers are likely causes...

but I agree, it is usually a better idea to do a clean install and then transfer settings and data there after...

Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[tlcscousin]

I have had to do quite a few repair installs and had about 90% success.
If the computer runs OK in safe mode but the windows explorer wont open in regular mode it is possible folder permissions where toasted. If you can enter into safe mode click on the cdrive and select security and add the user to the permissions and drill your way down to windows and repeat the adding permissions part. Then restart in regular mode and see if everything works ok.

 

[edfair]

It can be other than startup items that glitch. I've dumped other things out of the registry if they were suspect along with the related files. I would give examples if I remembered them.

If you start in command mode you may see something there that shows loading but the system hangs. That would possibly be a clue. My last one hung after AGP440 but it was worthless as a clue and I ended up with a clean load since I didn't have the right install CD for the occasion. The repair didn't honor the winnt location.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[DTracy]

What happens when you try Ctrl-Alt-Del and Select Task Manager and then Select New Task, run explorer.exe

Do you desktop icons come back?

regards,
David

 

[wolluf]

I've done several hundred repair reinstalls - handful (5-10) have failed, and I've found reason for some of those (replacement motherboard etc, where original was intel and new is amd. Need to boot into recovery console and run disable intelppm before the repair). I use nlite integrate CDs with SP3, MP11 and IE8 - though have noticed some oddities since incorporating ie8 - though not enough to fail the repair. Have had a few that hung at end of repair, but just powering off and on again fixed that. I generally take an image backup before starting so I can try again (eg, with different incorporations in the XP install CD). On one occasion when repair didn't work on intended target, tried it on another test machine - was ok, then repaired that on target, was ok.
I don't spend any time removing stuff beforehand - even if I have the luxury of being able to (usually not, as dead machine).

btw - sfc /scannow has never fixed anything for me!

 

[BadBigBen]

DTracy - in the original post, he already mentioned that it did not work...

but he should have killed "explorer.exe" first then attempt to restart explorer...



Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[goombawaho]

Killing Explorer and restarting it via Task Manager did NOT help the situation. NO desktop/no icons/hard drive cranking away. I'm smarter than not to try that.

Wolluf - it was the same exact PC in both instances, no new hardware at all.

 

[BadBigBen]

goombawaho - don't get offended, it just wasn't clear... and now it sounds like an explorer corruption or mismatch of certain DLL's...

you could always replace explorer with {link

http://www.sharpe-shell.org/news.php

]#Enviro[/url] or Emerge Desktop...

Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[tlcscousin]

I had the same issue with a customers computer and as suggested added the user to the security permissions for windows and system32 in safe mode and immediately on restart everything was working again.

 

[goombawaho]

I'm not offended, I'm just offensive.

 

[goombawaho]

I like the following two ideas most of everything posted:

1. Chipset installation. I may not have done that and will try from SAFE MODE the next time immediately after installation is complete after the obligatory reboot.

2. "Start in command mode you may see something there that shows loading but the system hangs