Corrupted Windows, can't see installation in recovery interface. Any alternatives?

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FelixC

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Jul 4, 2010
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A while ago I posted about a cascade of problems I was having with my computer which turned out to be due to a bad cluster on my hard drive. Well now problems are back and it's hit pretty hard. I turned it on this morning before heading to work to be greeted by a message that my Windows installation wasn't genuine (it is), coupled with errors and service failures. The ones I've counted so far are:

  • Aero interface is disabled.
  • Event viewer is unavailable. Error is "Event Log service is unavailable. Verify that the service is running."
  • Error "dwm.exe - Bad Image" reads "C:\Windows\system32\d3d10_1.dll is either not designed to run on Windows or it contains an error. Try installing the program again using original installation media opr contact your system administrator or the software vendor for support."
  • No internet connection. Warning sign next to the icon, stuck on "Identifying..." Running the troubleshooter yields nothing, says it can't identify the problem.
  • And another just popped up, I'm guessing this is responsible for the no internets problem: "jusched.exe - Bad Image" reads "C:\Windows\system32\dnsapi.dll is either not designed etc." just like the d3d10 one.

The first thing I did when I got back was run a check disk and it started listing a ton of files being corrupt and recovery of "orphaned" files and so on. It didn't fix the problem although a second check of the disk found no more corrupted files, so I'm guessing some of the damage was permanent.

Now here's the tricky part. In part, the system's still working. I fired up Steam in offline mode and launched Skyrim, works perfectly. So do media players and office programs, all my user data seems to be in place, etc. But obviously some core Windows files have gone stale. And it looks like I don't have any restore points. I guess I must've stupidly disabled the service some time ago.

And now here's what's even more infuriating - I tried putting the installation disc in to run a Repair but my installation is not visible in the recovery interface. Even though Windows does actually boot off the hard drive. I have a 64bit Windows 7 installation on an OCZ Vertex II SSD connected to a SATA3 port.

Is there anything I can do? Some way to get the recovery interface to recognise my installation and try that? Or some other way to restore core Windows files that have gone bad? I'm really hoping that I can avoid having to reinstall Windows from scratch and lose personalised data and have to reinstall all my programs, any advice would be very appreciated.
 
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When you run check disk are you allowing it to repair bad sectors and recover information? Boot to the recovery environment and cancel out, then open a cmd prompt from the menu and type in chkdsk c: /r

Also, when you had this problem before, did you reinstall on a new drive or reuse the old one? Once a drive starts having corrupted/reallocated sectors, the drive is toast. The only thing you could do to limp buy is to write zero's to the drive, then do a full format. But again, if sectors are starting to fail, there is nothing to do to fix it, and the drive will continue to lose sectors.
 
I'd set it to find and repair errors, it did seem to go through that.

I kept the same drive, the problems were solved and it was a single bad cluster so I figured I'd keep an eye on it and hope for the best. It was barely three months old, too. I did monitor it for over a month afterwards and I got no more errors in the System Log, so I thought that was that.

And this just in - Windows has just popped up a message saying:

Windows Activation

Windows must be restored

An unauthorised change was made to Windows. You must reinstall or restore Windows system files to activate.
Click to expand...

But I have no restore points, nor does my install disc see my Windows installation on the hard drive.
 
Just because the drive was only three months old does not mean nothing was wrong with it. I've had drives fail less than a week after installing them. If it is still under warranty I would RMA it. Since you have had two serious failures on the same drive, I think my point has been proven.
 
Definitely, that's what I'll be trying to do. Not sure how easy a time I'll have with that process, but I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

Thing is I'd like to first get the Windows installation back in full working order so I can then clone the drive onto another one, or something. If at all possible I'd rather go that route than scrap the install and take it from scratch.
 
replace drive and call it a day. quit trying all this BS of trying to get it to work
 
YeuEmMaiMai said:
replace drive and call it a day. quit trying all this BS of trying to get it to work
Click to expand...

I have to agree. if it is that screwed up, even if you did spend days to get it to do anything you are going to have a install of windows & programs that is corrupt and problematic. So you will need to repair install windows and probably most of your programs to be sure they are working. Just put the drive into another computer, pull off any files that you want, get a replacement drive, do a clean install and put your files back. then this time start making sure to have backups of your system so that any type of lose like this doesn't require anything more than a restore.
 
Well, I can go for a few days without having to rely on my desktop, so if I do have any options to repair the install I'd like to give 'em a shot. Most programs aren't showing any problems, I've only had one crap out on me on account of the dnsapi.dll in system32, might as well try. On suggestion I tried using the system file checker and it stated that corrupt files were found but "some" couldn't be fixed. Probably all.

I'm considering trying to extract files directly from the installation disc and overwrite the ones in my OS directory, but the problem is that I don't know which files have been corrupted. The CBS.log that SFC spat out is effectively unreadable, is there any way to get a list of the files identified as corrupted?
 
FelixC said:
Well, I can go for a few days without having to rely on my desktop, so if I do have any options to repair the install I'd like to give 'em a shot. Most programs aren't showing any problems, I've only had one crap out on me on account of the dnsapi.dll in system32, might as well try. On suggestion I tried using the system file checker and it stated that corrupt files were found but "some" couldn't be fixed. Probably all.

I'm considering trying to extract files directly from the installation disc and overwrite the ones in my OS directory, but the problem is that I don't know which files have been corrupted. The CBS.log that SFC spat out is effectively unreadable, is there any way to get a list of the files identified as corrupted?
Click to expand...

Hi, FelixC,

You've never given your system specs, but if you are OCing reset the BIOS to defaults. If you are not OCing then you are probably looking at a dying drive and the death will be a cascading event where you will loose everything.

Have you tested your RAM with Memtest86+ to rule out bad memory? If not, give it a try.

Have you tried booting to Safe Mode as Administrator to run chkdsk, and/or do the repair install?

Good luck.

Chuklr
 
Hey, thanks for the suggestions. The system's running at stock settings and I checked the RAM and went looking for malware the first time I had trouble with this drive. Ran check disc and the process did what little it could to no effect and Windows can't seem to repair its files with SFC either, though I haven't tried from Safe Mode. I'll give it a go, but doubt it'll act any different.
 
If you're booting into WinRE to run SFC. Then you need generally the additonal commandline flags in order to get it to scan properly. Or it'll just keep coming back that it has an error in a log file that means jack and squat.

Google for the SFC commandline on seperate windows partition, and you'll find those flags you should be using.

Regardless, if you'd have hardware failures or issues in the past and you haven't replaced it, you're only just pushing yourself further towards the cliff. Swap the hardware and move on.
 
Whelp, looks like the installation was beyond repair. So did a wipe and reinstall from scratch after all. A friend came down to help with flashing the drive firmware from 1.6 to 1.7, says OCZ had a problem in there that increased likelihood of corruption, then doing a secure erase "reset" of the thing with hdparm. I'm almost done with reinstalling all the basics so I'm going to look into getting an image of it after that and then see what my options are for replacing the drive. Thanks to everyone for your advice!
 
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