Unable to install XP can anyone help?

holly35 · 31 Jul 2008 at 20:23

A couple of days ago my boyfriends computer got a virus. Normally it is easily fixed with the Dell factory restore but this didn't work.

He spoke to Dell on the phone in India and they resent him all the XP start up disks. They then called him up again today to try and help him but then said they would call him back tomorrow. He put the first disk OS to install.

Everything was installing as normal until the last step where the BSOD came up with this message:

"A problem has been detected and windows has been shut down to prevent damage to your computer.

If this is the first time you've seen this Stop error screen, restart your computer. If this screen appears again, follow these steps:

check for viruses on your computer.Remove any newly installed hard drives or
hard drive controllers.Check your hard drive to make sure it is properly
conigured and terminated. Run CHKDSK/F to check for hard drive corruption,
and then restart your computer.

Technical information:
*** stop: 0x0000007B (0xF9E49528,oxC0000034,0x00000000,0x00000000)"

I tried going into safe mode but this message popped up again. I read somewhere else that formatting the hard drive would help but how can I do that when I have no access to any desktop? How do I run the CHKDSK/F?

ahhh :confused:

Any help appreciated! I google search for help and I couldnt see anything to help really.

H

decto · 31 Jul 2008 at 20:38

It sounds like you have a hardware problem otherwise the pc should have restored normally from the original disk.

http://www.memtest86.com/

download the ISO images suitable for creating a bootable Memtest86 CD-ROM

Then burn it to a cd. You'll need nero or similar as you need to burn as a disk image rather than just burn the iso onto a disk.

If you boot that disk it will run a memory test ... there should be no errors.

My guess would be that one of the memory sticks is faulty

AD

holly35 · 31 Jul 2008 at 20:54

Update : Neil just said the guy at Dell told him the virus removed some of the usb/cd/keyboard drivers so much so that they could no longer be restored.

I don't know if that pieve of info helps at all?

Burnsy2023 · 31 Jul 2008 at 20:58

holly35 said:
Update : Neil just said the guy at Dell told him the virus removed some of the usb/cd/keyboard drivers so much so that they could no longer be restored.

I don't know if that pieve of info helps at all?

A doubt it's a virus issue. A restore will repartition and format the HDD and there will be nothing in the RAM becuase you've booted off a CD.

If you can't restore, I would suggest that it's a hardware related issue, in which case try the memtest as suggested above.

One more thing, is there any more information when it BSOD?

Burnsy

Una · 31 Jul 2008 at 21:06

That stop message could mean anything really but yeah its a software problem and fixable, unlikely to be a hardware one as mentioned above.

If it was a bootsector virus I am not sure the restore will actually overwrite the MBR where it was (with windows).. fdisk /mbr might fix it.

However boot sector viruses are pretty rare these days so I doubt it.. really doing a proper format/restore and reinstall should fix everything. My guess is the restore you are doing is not completely cleaning things properly first.

.walls · 31 Jul 2008 at 22:19

Una said:
However boot sector viruses are pretty rare these days so I doubt it.. really doing a proper format/restore and reinstall should fix everything.

In the extremely unlikely event of a boot sector virus.... a format/restore would make no difference, as a format does not clear the boot sector

Go with the above suggestions of memtest.

Una · 31 Jul 2008 at 23:39

.walls said:
In the extremely unlikely event of a boot sector virus.... a format/restore would make no difference, as a format does not clear the boot sector

Go with the above suggestions of memtest.

Which is exactly why I said fdisk /mbr if that was the case - which I doubt. Without proper crashdump analysis its impossible to really say what caused that stop code, could be any number of things.

demonix · 3 Aug 2008 at 00:29

I'd have to go along the lines of a corrupt disc (or a driver issue or a loose cable) since the stop code relates to a "unaccessible boot device" error.

Also you should be able to do chkdsk/f from the recovery console on the OS disc (if the dell discs have the recovery console).