Help...Corrupted System32 Drivers on XP Pro

[Ira]

Here is the story. The other night, I shut down my computer, and by mistake, I hit the power button, causing it to reboot. When I realized what happened, I held the power button in to shut it down. The next day, when I went to boot it up, I got a message saying something like missing/corrupted system32.dll... Insert Windows Setup disk and press r at the first prompt to attempt to repair the problem. I do have 2 different hd in the computer. The c: is my primary and had my legal xp pro installed with sp1and has been working for nearly a year now. My second hdd was from an old setup I had where the o/s was installed, but did not have all the drivers, cards, etc installed. It is not the same o/s as my legal setup that is on c:. I can boot into the second drive by changing the setup in the bios. I cannot install all the updates or sp1/2 on the second drive. I did get the internet connection working, but that is about all. When I click on my computer, then click on the cd drive, it appears there is no disk in it. I even tried putting a different disk in it, but it will not read it either. The lights on the cd rom will flash on and off when disk is first inserted, but it won't read the disk.

Here are my problems:
1. Box would get to the screen above but would not go any further. I had to hard power it off or reset it to do anything.
2. When I try putting the Windows XP Pro update disk in to boot from it, the CD drive is not showing a disk or any files on the disk at all.
3. Now, when I change back to the c: drive in the bios and try to reboot, I no longer get the message about a corrupted file or anything. All it does is shut down automatically and attempt to reboot, and the whole process starts all over again.
4. The c: drive is ntfs and the second drive is formatted in fat32.
5. I have connected the 2nd drive to the net and installed all the updates to it that I can, but primary will still not boot and cd rom will not read from o/s in 2nd drive. I hoped the cd would start working after the updates were completed, but it will not.
6. I have tried to run restore on the c: drive from the 2nd one, but it is only showing restore points since the problem and nothing prior to it happening.
7. Since the cd rom will not read, I can't run the update/setup disk to repair the problem.

As I said before, I have to go into bios and change the setup to boot from the 2nd drive to get it to boot, but I still can't get into the c: drive.
Any suggestions on what I can do to get it up and working again? Thanks in advance.

Almost forgot...since I can't boot with my c: drive, I cannot boot to safe mode.

 

[hulksterjoe]

Does anyone else's head hurt from reading that.

so you shut down your system and on re-boot it gave you an error message.. I'm gonna assume that this was your C drive which you said is primary.. if so then why do we care about the other drive since its got nothing to do with the problem at hand.

So you booted the machine and it said to hit R to attempt a repair.. Did you?? it dosent appear like you did?

on #2) what is a Windows XP Pro update disk, if this is the disk that microsoft sent last year with sp1 updates and stuff then its not the disk you want.. Do you mean UPGRADE disk?

I'm at a loss as to what your doing with the 2nd drive.. you say you connected to the net and updated it, but you cant boot from it and "and cd rom will not read from o/s in 2nd drive" what is this supposed to mean. and if you cant boot, how are you attempting to do what you said in #6

 

[z-lite]

What a way to start the day...with a migraine! Haha, anyways, it seems like your CD drive went out since that happened to me with my old 486 machine. I put a CD, the lights would blink like they normally would but then the CD-ROM drive wouldn't show up in Windows. So I'd recommend a CD drive replacement first. After you fix that, you want to boot the computer with a Windows 2000 or XP install CD, be it full or upgrade version and when the setup first prompts you to install Windows 2000/XP by hitting Enter, you hit R to go into the Recovery Console. In there, you choose the installation that you want to work on and then enter the Administrator's password. After that, try a "chkdsk c: /r" (without the quotes, replace c with the drive letter you're working on) and that should fix the filesystem problem you might of created when you did a hard shutdown. Reboot into your C: drive. If you can not do that, I'd recommend copying all of your personal files from the C: drive onto your 2nd drive, format and start fresh with a clean install of Windows XP on the primary drive.

What kind of computer is this, self-built or OEM like Dell and HP? If it's a brand name, you can go to their website and download the drivers by entering your computer's model number.

 

[Ira]

Does anyone else's head hurt from reading that.

so you shut down your system and on re-boot it gave you an error message.. I'm gonna assume that this was your C drive which you said is primary.. if so then why do we care about the other drive since its got nothing to do with the problem at hand.

I mentioned the 2nd drive because I had no other way of testing the cd rom without having an operating system to boot into to try out the cd rom (actually a Liteon dvd burner).

So you booted the machine and it said to hit R to attempt a repair.. Did you?? it dosent appear like you did?

As I said in my initial post, the cd rom would not read a cd when inserted, just as it would not read it when I would boot into the 2nd drive. Because of this, I could not insert my setup disk and then hit R at the first option to attempt the repair. The disk has to be in before you can get to that stage.

on #2) what is a Windows XP Pro update disk, if this is the disk that microsoft sent last year with sp1 updates and stuff then its not the disk you want.. Do you mean UPGRADE disk?

Yes, I did mean to say upgrade. Sorry.

I'm at a loss as to what your doing with the 2nd drive.. you say you connected to the net and updated it, but you cant boot from it and "and cd rom will not read from o/s in 2nd drive" what is this supposed to mean.

I never said I couldn't boot into the 2nd drive. In the first post, I said, "I can boot into the second drive by changing the setup in the bios. I cannot install all the updates or sp1/2 on the second drive. I did get the internet connection working, but that is about all. When I click on my computer, then click on the cd drive, it appears there is no disk in it. I even tried putting a different disk in it, but it will not read it either. The lights on the cd rom will flash on and off when disk is first inserted, but it won't read the disk."

and if you cant boot, how are you attempting to do what you said in #6

By booting into 2nd drive, then clicking on My Computer, finding C drive, going to Program files, then finally Restore. When I found the Restore file and ran Restore, it was not showing anything prior to the date this happened.

Hope your headache gets better. All I wanted to do was simply state the specifics so that people wouldn't be posting something like "need more info" or asking all kinds of ?'s, but I guess it didn't work that way.

 

[z-lite]

Have you tried the suggestions in my post?

 

[Ira]

anyways, it seems like your CD drive went out since that happened to me with my old 486 machine. I put a CD, the lights would blink like they normally would but then the CD-ROM drive wouldn't show up in Windows. So I'd recommend a CD drive replacement first.

What kind of computer is this, self-built or OEM like Dell and HP? If it's a brand name, you can go to their website and download the drivers by entering your computer's model number.

Thanks for the help. I did build the computer myself over a year ago and it has been trouble free until now. The CD-ROM does show up in Windows...only the files will not. It appears to be a blank disk. I guess there is a possibility it is bad, but it is actually a Liteon DVD burner that is about a year old, and has had less than 10 cd's/dvd's burned on it. I do have another CD-ROM in another box, and will take it out, install it in there, and see if it will read.

 

[TeamStrykerCore]

Check the cabling for the drive.
Also have you tried F8 and Boot from "Last Known Good Configuration"

 

[Ira]

Have you tried the suggestions in my post?

Ok, I changed out my dvd drive for an old cd drive. Just remembered that a couple weeks ago, my daughter vacuumed the inside of my computer out, and just wondering if she may have possibly loosened a cable. The cd/dvd-rom has not been used since prior to then. Anyway, I can get the cd disk to read with the other cd-rom. I have ran chkdsk, and it said it repaired 1 or more files in the c: drive. When I went back to bios and changed boot order back to hdd and then cd-rom, it will get as far as asking whether to boot into safemode, last known config, or start windows normally. No matter which one I click, computer reboots, gets back to the same screen, and then reboots again.

Any other ideas? I would love to get this drive back up instead of having to reload everything. Thanks.

 

[z-lite]

From the sounds of it, the OS is corrupted and you'll either have to do a repair install, replacement install or fresh install to get your system up and running. I recommend copying everything from the first drive to your 2nd drive, and reinstall Windows XP onto the first drive.

 

[Ira]

From the sounds of it, the OS is corrupted and you'll either have to do a repair install, replacement install or fresh install to get your system up and running. I recommend copying everything from the first drive to your 2nd drive, and reinstall Windows XP onto the first drive.

Can you explain the difference between a repair install and replacement install? Also, how do I do them? Thanks again.

 

[z-lite]

I made up the name for replacement install but for a repair install, the Windows XP setup detects that there is WinXP already installed and it'll ask you if you want to repair it. Replacement install is installing Windows XP without formatting, leaving all your files on the HD but profiles from the old setup will have to be created and most programs would have to be reinstalled.

 

[hulksterjoe]

when you boot from the windows disk it will detect that you already have an os on the drive and will give you the option to "R"epair the installation or format .. just follow the directions for repair , windows will overwrite itself and leave all of your stuff intact, vs a reinstallation which wipes everything..

<EDIT> damn my slow typing I knew I shouldnt have gotten up to get a cup of coffee.