Laptop problem.

[old.Tohtori]

Well i'd ask the techies, but the response time is a bit long and time is short.

Not that there's anything wrong with being short.

But...my bro's laptop's windows went buggered and i can't seem to repair it with a win cd. I COULD install the system anew, but that would mean the possibility of "my documents" being destroyed and that's the part of the lappie where his pictures and all important stuff is.

So...what are my options? Is it possible to extract info from the laptop without windows? Is it possible to hook the HD of a lappie into a regular PC? And so forth.

Suggestions and any tips leading to the extraction of files will be rewarded with ...something

 

[Roalith]

What exactly's gone buggered with the Windows install? Tried booting into safe mode?

 

[evzy]

Throw it out of a moving car, then reverse back over the case - hopefully that should break the case and he will be able to get his pictures out then

 

[old.Tohtori]

Complaining about a...err...what was it...ntfs.sys or some sh*t like that.

Have to boot and see.

 

[Neffneff]

Throw it out of a moving car, then reverse back over the case - hopefully that should break the case and he will be able to get his pictures out then

lol!

on a more serious note, i believe you can get ahold of converter thingy-me-jigs to put laptop hdds into normal PCs and salvage data from there.

there is always the chance being able to use DoS to move the data into a safer place as well before re-installing, although if the filesystem was NTFS dont think that works, been ages since i tried to do that though.

 

[Alan]

lol!

on a more serious note, i believe you can get ahold of converter thingy-me-jigs to put laptop hdds into normal PCs and salvage data from there.

there is always the chance being able to use DoS to move the data into a safer place as well before re-installing, although if the filesystem was NTFS dont think that works, been ages since i tried to do that though.

Yup we use those at work, you can get an adapter to connect a laptop HDD to a standard ATA socket.

You can also boot using NTFSDOS from sysinternals or linux, both can read NTFS partitions.

 

[old.Tohtori]

I'm such a repair thingy noob...

I need more lamer advice

By the by, it sayes that windows can't start up 'cause system32/drivers/ntfs.sys is missing or corrupt.

 

[Neffneff]

im not 100% sure (as i havnt done it before) but i think you could boot using the XP CD, and use the recovery console option to copy NTFS.sys accross to c:\windows\system32\drivers\ all over again?

someone more knowledgable here prolly knows.

edit: alternatively, if you have installed SP2 and not removed the files, you should be able to get a fresh copy of the file from:

C:\WINDOWS\ServicePackFiles\i386

 

[Dudley52]

I think that may be a virus

 

[Neffneff]

i presume it would go something along the lines of

1. use XP CD to boot to recovery console

2. cd windows

3. type "copy C:\WINDOWS\ServicePackFiles\i386\ntfs.sys C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\ntfs.sys"

if anyone knows better, and im giving out garbage advice, please say so.

 

[old.Tohtori]

I think that may be a virus

Heh, more then possible.

I'm trying to make heads and tails out of the recovery console but...damn i'm crap at it

Ah...gotta try that copy thing now. Be back with results

 

[old.Tohtori]

Well. That worked...well not really...but the copy worked

Copied the file yet it persists on complaining about the file

Guess my only option is to A: Re install windows and risk loosing the files or B: Somehow with the adapter thingy(would appreciate detailed advice) copy the files to my computart.

 

[Neffneff]

does it start booting at all or does it instantly fook up?

if its the latter, you could try typing "fixboot" at the recovery console, this will put re-write the boot sector if im right and MAYBE fix yer problem.

edit : "fixmbr" is another one to try.

 

[old.Tohtori]

does it start booting at all or does it instantly fook up?

if its the latter, you could try typing "fixboot" at the recovery console, this will put re-write the boot sector if im right and MAYBE fix yer problem.

edit : "fixmbr" is another one to try.

It does the loading bar thing (not windows, the one before, with the gray blocks...incredibly slow) and then complains about the file.

I'll try those a bit later again. Ta

 

[MaCaBr3]

Can you start in safe mode?

 

[DocWolfe]

the disk could have bad sectors run scandisk

 

[Saggy]

"Missing or Corrupt Ntfs.sys" Error Message When You Restart Windows XP After You Convert Your Hard Disk to the NTFS File System

RESOLUTION
To resolve this problem, you must replace the missing or corrupted Ntfs.sys file. To do so, follow these steps:

1. Start your computer with the Windows XP CD-ROM in the CD-ROM drive.

2. You are prompted with the following option:

To repair a Windows XP installation using Recovery Console, press R
When you are prompted with this option, press R to select it.

3. At the command prompt, type the following commands (press ENTER after each command):
cd \windows\system32\drivers
ren ntfs.sys ntfs.old

Note This step renames the corrupted Ntfs.sys file to Ntfs.old. If the Ntfs.sys file is not found, then the file was missing.

4. At the command prompt, type the following command, and then press ENTER:
copy cd:\i386\ntfs.sys drive:\windows\system32\drivers

Where cd is the drive letter for the CD-ROM drive that contains the Windows XP CD, and drive is the drive that you installed Windows XP to.

5. Remove the Windows XP CD from your CD-ROM drive, type quit, and then press ENTER to quit the Recovery Console.

6. Restart Windows XP

...

I suppose getting this or similar (sata/pata depending on the HDD) would be the easiest solution.

 

[tamtap]

boot up into command prompt mode (can use the cd to do this). Then you want to fix up the hard disk.

fdisk works wonders. be sure to remove any partitions you may find as virus creates them.

reboot and tada sorted.

Tam

 

[Neffneff]

boot up into command prompt mode (can use the cd to do this). Then you want to fix up the hard disk.

fdisk works wonders. be sure to remove any partitions you may find as virus creates them.

reboot and tada sorted.

Tam

either you cant explain things well, or you need a kicking.

 

[old.Tohtori]

boot up into command prompt mode (can use the cd to do this). Then you want to fix up the hard disk.

fdisk works wonders. be sure to remove any partitions you may find as virus creates them.

reboot and tada sorted.

Tam

This would be a great thing to do, but as said, i need the files in teh computer which are located in windows forlders

EDIT: Well, i renamed the old one and copied the ntfs file and on bootup...it complains about the ntfs file

 

[Roalith]

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=822800 might help?

Or http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;555531

Edit: Meh, teach me to read earlier posts

Are you sure you're copying the ntfs.sys from the correct version of XP? Shouldn't make a difference I know, but it is Microsoft after all

 

[Sparx]

dont think he is replying with an answer, he's banned. Wonder why

 

[Roalith]

oO odd.

 

[old.Tohtori]

I was banzored for a norty picture. Well, norty text really...but i won't talk about it 'cause i don't know how the "rules" go about talking about bannings.

Annyhoop, nothing worked and i'd need some lamen advice on what to buy to hook it up on my pc and how to actually get the data out with the adapter thingy.

 

[Mojo]

u need something like this

http://www.datapro.net/products/1920.html

 

[old.Tohtori]

u need something like this

http://www.datapro.net/products/1920.html

Allrighty.

Thanks mate, hope that settlers my problems

 

[Jeremiah]

Cant you just use the WinXP disc to repair the currently installed one? I had this same problem and I was just going to do a complete reinstall, but I got a message saying a previous version of windows xp had been detected, and did I want to repair that one instead.

 

[Lamp]

Can you start in safe mode?

Who him, or the computer ? ;p