Computer that won't boot

[dr_jo]

I'm really really stuck, and I'm also not really a techie, so any answers would need to be in plain english

I run windows XP.

I switched on my computer, and got this message: "Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:
<windows roo>\system32\hal.dll"

I tried using my XP install disk to repair it, and the file came up as being there on dir. I tried copying it, renaming it, deleting it and "expanding" a new version on, but it wouldn't let me do any of it. It always said "access denied" or "cannot find file"

I also tried attrib to stop it being read only, but it said it couldn't find the file.

I'm completely stumped. Any ideas?

 

[(Shovel)]

Erk... that doesn't sound very nice...

I googled around a bit, and checked the Microsoft Knowledgebase as well:

Threw up this: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;330184

It doesn't seem to add up, since it seems to suggest that the problem comes from upgrading to XP - not on an install that's 9 months old. Very, very, strange. However, it may well be worth a look. The instructions in the link are probably better than me trying to rehash them, so I shall refer to them
I *think* it's possible to start up the recovery console with network support, if so I'd recommend making a backup of boot.ini to one of the other machines, since there's no floppy disk drive on your machine

Have you been able to enter safe mode? If you can, you can log in as the "Administrator" account - which I think should allow you to exchange systems files. If not, then again it's probably going to be the recovery console solution.

 

[PR.]

Originally posted by dr_jo
I'm really really stuck, and I'm also not really a techie, so any answers would need to be in plain english

I run windows XP.

I switched on my computer, and got this message: "Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:
<windows roo>\system32\hal.dll"

I tried using my XP install disk to repair it, and the file came up as being there on dir. I tried copying it, renaming it, deleting it and "expanding" a new version on, but it wouldn't let me do any of it. It always said "access denied" or "cannot find file"

I also tried attrib to stop it being read only, but it said it couldn't find the file.

I'm completely stumped. Any ideas?

Did you do the repair bit using the Repair Console in XP or where you trying to do it through windows?

 

[dr_jo]

PR: I used the repair console on the xp disk. It doesn't boot to windows for me to do it through there. If that makes sense?

There has been some progress made. We ran something called "Check disk", which said it had found a problem, and when we looked, it had delete hal.dll. We then replaced it with the file from the cd, everything's good.

So now, it gets a little further, before you get a blue screen with yellow(?) writing popping up for a moment (too fast to read it), and then it re-boots. And it keeps on cycling round....

You can tell it to boot in safe mode, but it still cycles.

 

[Tom]

Originally posted by dr_jo
I switched on my computer, and got this message: "Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:
<windows roo>\system32\hal.dll"

Does your computer sing "Daisy, Daisy......"?

 

[Insane]

Originally posted by dr_jo

I switched on my computer, and got this message: "Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:
<windows roo>\system32\hal.dll"

windows is "fubar" on you.

HAL is all to do with how windows talks to all your gear in that box, if its gone then windows cant see jack (or jill for that matter)

you need to "reinstall" so slap in the WindowsXP disk, reboot and boot from the CD.

go to setup Windows XP, and it will detect your install of WindowsXP automatically, just let it then "reinstall" windows.

once done, you'll need to re-patch windows XP up to where you were before, so run SP1/Windows Update and you'll be fine.

that enough plain english?

 

[(Shovel)]

Having been talking to Jo about this fair bit, I'm curious as to whether anyone know's why this happens?

Does HAL get regularly changed in daily operation (since no upgrades or even software had been changed when the problem came up). I noticed that there's a command line switch for the boot.ini (/HAL=xxx) that can tell Windows to use a different HAL. After a reinstall, if the HAL.dll were backed up for this computer, would that then be able to be used in say 6 months, or a year if the problem were ever to recurr again?

 

[Trem]

Sounds like a corrupt boot sector to me, run repair/recovery console from the xp disc, it will ask you which partition you want to repair(usually 1), choose it then let it get to a cursor, type FIXBOOT, it will ask if you are sure, type Y or yes. Hey ho all should be spiffy...........SHOULD! Boot from the xp disc as though you are reinstalling but choose the "repair a windows installation" option(I forgot to say this at the beginning).

 

[Insane]

Originally posted by (Shovel)
Having been talking to Jo about this fair bit, I'm curious as to whether anyone know's why this happens?

could be down to anything, dodgy IDE drivers writing code wrong or anything.. if you wanted to be nit-picky you could get all the software to diagnose it and discover it. its one of these problems you get as a computer engineer where there is no clear line in the sand and you need to study it further.

normally its easier just to wipe it, start from scratch and try a different driver, or different piece of hardware which corrisponds to it.

hal is essencially a static "driver" which everything must go through to talk to the hardware, its actually called "Hardware Abstraction Layer" and is used by the NT codebase to restrict what goes through to the hardware and the main kernel, to stop rogue programs causing mayhem and general instability (remember win98 when something crashed? 1/2 of windows went with it) so its mission-critical... if you change the HAL your probably changing between ACPI and standard PC. (i need to confirm this again tho)

it could all be down to an issue with the hard drives heads, sometimes they can develop a read/write failure occasionally and wreck data on the drive when accessing it... an easy way to check is run a checkdisk and note the problems it fixed, then shift a couple of gig of files around it then try again and seen what checkdisk errors come up afterwards.

tho it might be wise and do what everybody says, repair the XP installation with the install disk and let it run, if it breaks in another couple of months then it might be an issue with the hard disk, its a case of trial and error when these problems come up.

you might get away with replacing the HAL.dll through recovery console with the backup, but i've never tried it and if you've patched the machine prior to doing it you might end up causing more problems.

my favourite command currently is format [drivename]