Stumped by Vista's insubordination

winston856 · Dec 16, 2007

Alright so I am or was having similar problems as cerebrex in his thread about Vista problems.

I was on my computer the other night when odd things started happening. Such as when I opened Foobar it said that foo_columns.dll had been removed, which I never did so I go to the folder and the file's still there.....

Secondly I tried to open a notepad file I created a few days ago and it said that access was denied......

So I go "okay, enough with this." *reboot* bam, black screen with mouse cursor. After another try at rebooting it was quite apparent that Vista was not going to load. It would get past the bar scrolling screen and just go black with the mouse cursor only.

That's fine, I'll just go to safe mode right? Nope same deal, loads files then black screen.

Alright, still not disheartened I slam in the ultimate x64 disc and hit up the boot recovery tool, it finds no errors.....

At this point I knew something bigger was going on so I searched and found cerebrex's thread and his problem's were similar to mine (random) however I haven't suffered from BSOD's. Anyhow I know my memory is stable because of the memtest and orthos runs I've done to verify my overclock was stable. But just to humor bbz_Ghost I ran memtest again for over 6 hours tonight and not a single error, just as I had thought.

Now I would love to boot up and try those virus scan sites, but alas I cannot boot. I do have NOD32 installed though and it's kept up to date with regular scans and it hadn't alerted me to any suspicious activity since my install.

So now I'm wondering if my raptor is going south on me, the only way this could have happened is through some form of HDD corruption right? I'm not sure what I should do next. Can anybody offer assistance? I'd be very greatful

Although I'm aware I could just reformat, I don't really want this issue creeping up on me again, also I have some important files I need to obtain off this install before the format. Otherwise I'd be formatted already.

Rebel44 · Dec 16, 2007

Connect your HDD to another PC
Login to non-admin account
Try those anti virus scans
After you make sure there is no virus backup all your important data
Test your HDD using HD Tune - if you get lots of errors ist time for RMA - if not just reformat and install your OS back.

Hurdler · Dec 16, 2007

When you log into your computer, and you get that black screen, do you also get an explorer window (not IE) open to "my documents"? I get that on one of my machines for some reason, but from there I can start explorer.exe and it fixes my problem. Until I restart...

It might not be the same thing that you're having, but it's still really weird and annoying!

winston856 · Dec 16, 2007

Rebel44 said:
Connect your HDD to another PC
Login to non-admin account
Try those anti virus scans
After you make sure there is no virus backup all your important data
Test your HDD using HD Tune - if you get lots of errors ist time for RMA - if not just reformat and install your OS back.

How would I access a non-admin account in Vista? I'd use my brother's PC for this and it's got Vista x86 on it.

Hurdler said:
When you log into your computer, and you get that black screen, do you also get an explorer window (not IE) open to "my documents"? I get that on one of my machines for some reason, but from there I can start explorer.exe and it fixes my problem. Until I restart...

It might not be the same thing that you're having, but it's still really weird and annoying!

Nah, it's just a pure black screen with the mouse cursor :/

winston856 · Dec 16, 2007

Anybody else have any ideas?

Rebel44 · Dec 16, 2007

if you connect that HDD to PC with Vista if you have UAC turned on just login to some account. As long as UAC is active any program or user action which require Admin privilages AUC will give you choice "allow" or "deny" .

winston856 · Dec 16, 2007

Ok so I've connected the HDD to my bro's Vista box and upon the first boot I checked the BIOS to verify that the drive was found, which it was. Now in window's in "computer" the drive is listed as G:\ and the whole thing is "not accessible".

I can't do any error checks or anything on it because the drive is not accessible. The platters are spinning in the drive however.

I'll try and reboot to see what happens. I wonder if the whole drive just died?

Here's a pictuer of the current situation:

Rev Lemmon · Dec 17, 2007

Looks like it might a dead drive.

Finn · Dec 17, 2007

You should try the drive in a computer which has a properly working OS before trashing it.

Rebel44 · Dec 17, 2007

Click Start / Search - type: diskmgmt.msc - you should be able to format, partiont etc. that HDD - if you cant do anything with your HDD its most likely dead.

Ricey · Dec 17, 2007

sounds like your drive died to me.

What brand HD is it? I know maxtor has a utility u boot into like a boot disk where you can run diagnostics as such, you actually need to run it before you can RMA it to Maxtor so they have proof something is wrong beforehand. Not sure if Western digital and seagate does but its worth a shot to look around their site for one. I know there are other programs that can do diagnostics thru a boot disk. Dont remember the names of them though since its been awhile since i worked at a computer repair company but you can probably google it.

winston856 · Dec 17, 2007

Ricey said:
sounds like your drive died to me.

What brand HD is it? I know maxtor has a utility u boot into like a boot disk where you can run diagnostics as such, you actually need to run it before you can RMA it to Maxtor so they have proof something is wrong beforehand. Not sure if Western digital and seagate does but its worth a shot to look around their site for one. I know there are other programs that can do diagnostics thru a boot disk. Dont remember the names of them though since its been awhile since i worked at a computer repair company but you can probably google it.

Man I guess people just don't read signatures anymore

I'll look around WD site for something, my drive's still under warranty so I'm good there.

I'm still going to try and format it through disk management today.

winston856 · Dec 17, 2007

Ok so in disk management the drive is listed as healthy.

I tried changing the letter of the drive and it let me, still not letting me access it so I went into the properties and tried to run the error checking tool, which it's doing right now.

I didn't want to format it and find it could format then stop it because I wasn't sure if I could still get my files off there.

So it's checking the disk right now.

calebb · Dec 17, 2007

What speed is your CPU clocked at?

Try running it at stock voltages/speeds until you get this straightened out...

winston856 · Dec 17, 2007

calebb said:
What speed is your CPU clocked at?

Try running it at stock voltages/speeds until you get this straightened out...

Yeah I would except I've got the drive hooked up to my brother's computer still and his box is 100% stock

3/4's of the way done with the disk check, I've got the WD Diagnostic tool to try next depending on the outcome of this.

winston856 · Dec 17, 2007

Alright well the little utility froze after it analyzed all the sectors, the bar was 100% full but the two button choices were still start or cancel, not close like it usually says when it's done I think.

So I soft rebooted the computer and it's still not accessible, then I got WD's WinDLG program and the raptor passed both the short and extended tests.

So I guess it's not dead, however it is screwed up enough to the point that it will not load the OS and will not let me access any files. Very weird, so is there any chance of file recovery?

Rebel44 · Dec 18, 2007

As long as HDD is not accessible you wont be able to recover yor data

- maybe its possible to acces your data somehow but I dont know how.

Ricey · Dec 18, 2007

winston856 said:
Man I guess people just don't read signatures anymore

I'll look around WD site for something, my drive's still under warranty so I'm good there.

I'm still going to try and format it through disk management today.

Dont read much at 4am

My head kinda just moves about like im drunk

But yah if you cant access it even from another computer or thru a boot disk then theres not much chance of recovery unless u send it in to one of those recovery companies that charge you your liver and kidney.

Finn · Dec 18, 2007

Hook it up to an XP box, this might be some Vista related quirk.

osalcido · Dec 18, 2007

did you have the drive encrypted with bit locker?

DrFreeze · Dec 18, 2007

this is a long shot, but you could try using an ubuntu 7.10 boot disk, 7.10 includes full NTFS support out of the box, so if the disk still has a valid ntfs partition, and is OK, as the WD tool would suggest, you should be able to access it

Vista might be detecting some other vista install with a different user, and preventing access for some dumb reason

Nenu · Dec 18, 2007

If you know anyone with Spinrite or HDD Regenerator, beg them to test your drive.
If that fixes it, you might wanna buy a copy, I use HDD Regenerator and its mighty useful.
It fixes all manner of corruptions including perceived bad sectors that are not bad at all, just data written wrongly.

rgratto2 · Dec 18, 2007

DrFreeze said:
this is a long shot, but you could try using an ubuntu 7.10 boot disk, 7.10 includes full NTFS support out of the box, so if the disk still has a valid ntfs partition, and is OK, as the WD tool would suggest, you should be able to access it

Vista might be detecting some other vista install with a different user, and preventing access for some dumb reason

I would agree with this - using an ubuntu Live cd seems like a good option. Although if it were vista preventing access, I should think that it would at least display the disk size?

winston856 · Dec 18, 2007

Thanks for all the help guys

I did a search here and found people were recommending GetDataBack so I got a copy of that and was able to recover my files

yay!

Now I'm just going to format and start over, then I'm going to run a full virus scan on my second HDD to make sure there's no virus's on there that could've came over.

No I was not using BitLocker.

woot!

NTJedi · Dec 18, 2007

winston856 said:
Thanks for all the help guys

I did a search here and found people were recommending GetDataBack so I got a copy of that and was able to recover my files yay!

Now I'm just going to format and start over, then I'm going to run a full virus scan on my second HDD to make sure there's no virus's on there that could've came over.

No I was not using BitLocker.

woot!

From reviews on newegg and my own personal experience I'd recommend buying a Seagate harddrive next time. Let us know whether or not formatting the harddrive and a clean install works for the harddrive.

winston856 · Dec 18, 2007

NTJedi said:
From reviews on newegg and my own personal experience I'd recommend buying a Seagate harddrive next time. Let us know whether or not formatting the harddrive and a clean install works for the harddrive.

Yes I've had Seagate HDD's before and they're great pieces of hardware. However they do not to my knowledge make a their own version of the raptor. I bought the raptor because it's the only one of it's kind, cheaper and SATA.

I'm going to format tonight after I get home from work (9:30ish) so I'll post then on how it goes

winston856 · Dec 19, 2007

Alright so after getting home from work and enjoying a nice bowl of yogurt and a bowl of cottage cheese

I decided to get this going.

Well suffice it to say Vista is back installed and it went without one hitch. I haven't done anything yet as far as drivers or whatnot, it's just a fresh load of Vista and it seems to work fine. I just shut it off and will fire it up tomorrow and start installing things.

One of the first things ot get installed is NOD32 v2.70 and I'm scanning my secondary HDD for viruses.

Once again a big thank you to all the folk that helped me and participated in this thread, I greatly appreciate all the feedback

Happy computing

bbz_Ghost · Dec 19, 2007

Good luck...

winston856 · Dec 20, 2007

Well everything seems to be working great. I did a scan of my second HDD and found a W32 trojan variant in a Warcraft III patch I had downloaded a while back. Needless to say that's gone now, I'm virus free!

Thanks again,

bbz_Ghost · Dec 20, 2007

To all those that say "I've never had an infection, I don't surf <xxx> sites (no pun intended, insert whatever), I know what I'm doing," none of that means anything because even in the most absolutely innocuous methods can an infection happen - and you won't even be aware of it till it's too late.

Good job, have fun now that you're back up and running...

Nenu · Dec 20, 2007

bbz_Ghost said:
To all those that say "I've never had an infection, I don't surf <xxx> sites (no pun intended, insert whatever), I know what I'm doing," none of that means anything because even in the most absolutely innocuous methods can an infection happen - and you won't even be aware of it till it's too late.

Good job, have fun now that you're back up and running...

Absolut!!

Finn · Dec 20, 2007

bbz_Ghost said:
To all those that say "I've never had an infection, I don't surf <xxx> sites (no pun intended, insert whatever), I know what I'm doing," none of that means anything because even in the most absolutely innocuous methods can an infection happen - and you won't even be aware of it till it's too late.

Good job, have fun now that you're back up and running...

I surf porn sites, warez sites (for no-cd hacks on paid games) and generally install all kinds of stuff on my computer. Yet I haven't encountered a single virus in years. I run avg on one, nod32 on other and no antivirus on my vista box. Neither AV has come up with anything but a couple of false positives.

What am I doing wrong, why am I not getting infected? I mean with all the unsecure stuff I'm doing you'd think I would have a million bugs on my computer already.

Probably this would be the case if I used IE to surf though..

Nasty_Savage · Dec 20, 2007

I kinda glanced over this, but I did notice that a certain Microsoft Update whacked out my RAID array, SP1 Whacked out my RAID array too. I am trying to isolate which one it is. Basically I booted from CD and restored one of the shadow copies to get back up and running...but I think there's a colossal fuckup in one of their updates somewhere. Just something to keep in mind before you go crazy if it happens to you...

winston856 · Dec 20, 2007

bbz_Ghost said:
To all those that say "I've never had an infection, I don't surf <xxx> sites (no pun intended, insert whatever), I know what I'm doing," none of that means anything because even in the most absolutely innocuous methods can an infection happen - and you won't even be aware of it till it's too late.

Good job, have fun now that you're back up and running...

Boy isn't that the truth, I was in that category you just described and I've been humbled :/

I'm now going to scan everything I download, period.

Stumped by Vista's insubordination

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