System Hive recovery on OEM systems?

[Dano]

Anybody done this and had any issues? I have a laptop here that is refusing to boot due to:

Windows XP could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt: \WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\CONFIG\SYSTEM

Now while hopefully a CHKDSK may fix it and all will be good I was looking up the proceedure for recovering the system from the hive back up files and came accross this warning from MS:

Warning Do not use the procedure that is described in this article if your computer has an OEM-installed operating system. The system hive on OEM installations creates passwords and user accounts that did not exist previously. If you use the procedure that is described in this article, you may not be able to log back into the recovery console to restore the original registry hives.

Which leaves me with funtime Anybody actually done this on an OEM and have any input at all please?

 

[HarryPainful]

Done it loads of times on XP systems.

Check disk will not fix that, the actual hive is corrupt.

Just rename the old one and copy the back up to the location and rename it.

 

[bledd]

another daft issue that's been a problem since windows2000 (maybe nt), which ms should have implemented an autofix for.


if not exist "working copy of s32\config" goto repair
goto end
:repair
copy windows\repair\config \WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\CONFIG
:end


there you go ms, i'm a genius

 

[Dano]

Done it loads of times on XP systems.

Check disk will not fix that, the actual hive is corrupt.

Just rename the old one and copy the back up to the location and rename it.

Yes, but were they OEM installed systems or not? Anyway, check disk did indeed fix it.