problem

Discussion in 'Software' started by Mof, Mar 26, 2008.

  1. MacAllan

    MacAllan Byte Poster

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    Don't jump to conclusions, troubleshoot step by step - I've had the same sort of error before from faulty memory, even though said memory passed the startup BIOS memory test.
     
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  2. greenbrucelee
    Highly Decorated Member Award

    greenbrucelee Zettabyte Poster

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    Always try lots of different tests to find the issue. Download memtest86 and burn the image to CD then sety the bios to boot from the CD. memtest will run lots of tests to determing wether the memory is faulty.

    If you can do F8 while the machine is booting and try and get to the command promt run CHKDSK to see if the hard disk has any knackered clusters etc.

    If the hard disk is making grinding noises then it is knackered.

    Although it doesn't sound like an issue with the PSU you could use a multimeter to check it out.
     
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  3. hbroomhall

    hbroomhall Petabyte Poster Gold Member

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    You say two hard drives attached to a RAID. Are these configured as a RAID, or just individiual?

    Because if as a RAID then the CD boot method won't work. One way of dealing with this without lots of extra standby disks is to:
    1) Temporarily disconnect the RAID drives
    2) mount a new drive in the machine on a non-RAID point
    3) Install XP
    4) Add the RAID drivers
    5) Reconnect the RAID and attempt to mount it.

    You should now have access to the data, so archive it off before you do anything else!

    Harry.
     
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  4. Mof

    Mof Megabyte Poster

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    thanks everybody at home now will start implementing your ideas tomorrow.

    back to reading my Mike Meyers book now.Out of the pan into the fire.
     
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  5. Wassup

    Wassup Byte Poster

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    if you dont have a password, try ERD Commander and reset the password on the chosen account.
    or
    a trick i picked up from these very forums is to use the ophcrack Live C, which is essentially a password revealer utility

    oh! and check there is no floppy disk in the drive :D
     
  6. Mof

    Mof Megabyte Poster

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    Afternoon everyone
    we have got into the recovery program but trying to input new commands but comming up access denied.



    were at step 5

    md tmp
    copy c:\windows\system32\config\system c:\windows\tmp\system.bak
     
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  7. hbroomhall

    hbroomhall Petabyte Poster Gold Member

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    Which command of those two gave access denied?

    If it was the first one - did you log in with the correct admin account?

    A bit more detail would help as well. There have been quite a few alternatives mentioned in this thread, so it would help if you said how you got to this stage.

    Harry.
     
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  8. Mof

    Mof Megabyte Poster

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    md tmp
    we got here after computer would not start with error message windows\system32\config\system is missing or corrupt

    two hard drives connected by a raid, we have taken the raid out of action and have now been able to reach recovery.
     
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  9. hbroomhall

    hbroomhall Petabyte Poster Gold Member

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    On the surface of it - you are not using the admin account.

    Can you see the Windows directory?

    However - you stated earlier that you were going to use a different hard drive because you couldn't even get the recovery console.

    So what *in detail* have you done to get this far?

    Edit - we seem to be posting at the same time - I see your amendment on the RAID.

    Harry.
     
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  10. hbroomhall

    hbroomhall Petabyte Poster Gold Member

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    Er - drives that were part of a RAID system can't normally be accessed with the RAID switched off. The only exception that I can think of to this rule is RAID 1. Was this a RAID 1 system?

    Harry.
     
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  11. Mof

    Mof Megabyte Poster

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    Hello Harry thanks for your patience

    with one hard drive connected to mother board there does not seem to be an admin account just goes through to windows system recovery but after that its access denied, with the raid disconected we can see one of the hard drives both tested with raid connected cant see any. not sure if the problem is with the raid card it would seem one hard drive has had it, but still cant work out why we get access degnied on the other hard drive the computer seems to see.
     
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  12. hbroomhall

    hbroomhall Petabyte Poster Gold Member

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    I'm afraid I'm having a hard time disentangling this...

    Is this one of the drives from the RAID? Or some other drive? And are you saying that you are connecting to a different controller that doesn't have RAID?
    What actually happens? Are you using the XP CD and pressing 'R', or is this something else? The recovery console asks for the admin password. If you don't get that then you are doing something else!
    If it is disconnected how are you seeing the drives? Or do you mean that you disable the RAID in the BIOS?
    I'm afraid I can't follow this!
    What type of RAID is it?

    Harry.
     
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  13. GiddyG

    GiddyG Terabyte Poster Gold Member

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    I agree Harry... this is confusing.

    If it was RAID 1, then an issue with one hard disk should mean the other will still work, unless it wasn't duplexed and the disk controller had gone; then again, that surely wouldn't give the corruption message.

    Mof, you need to give more precise information on how the machine was setup, and what changes you may have made as Harry has stated. We'll have more of a chance to help you then.

    Forget the previous emails, and bullet what you know about the machine configuration both before the issues happened, and what you have done, set by step, in trying to fix it.

    Cheers

    John
     
  14. Mof

    Mof Megabyte Poster

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    Thanks everyone problem solved.
    we dont need the raid card so we have removed it and replaced the two old hard drives with one new ond re installed windows and away we go. Yes we have lost some information on old drives but as it was running a digital enlarger from this computer we had all settings backed up on disc.

    so yet again thanks to everyone i found your comments verry useful

    we supect it was a faulty raid card. We went for a new hard drive as the other two were 5 years old.
     
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