windows trying to reinstall on reboot ? ? ?

[eljay333]

Hi guys,
I am very new to this so not sure exactly what your gonna need to know however I just wonder if anyone can help.

The initial problem I had was that some bright spark (me) had attempted to launch safe mode on the pc using msconfig settings. Once this had been done I could neither get into safe mode or any other mode as it would only attempt to boot into safe mode than asked me for a password which for some reason didn't seem to be the one I had set up. To get round this I slaved hard drive to other pc and changed the boot.ini file to not include safe mode booting.

Once this was done I replaced hard drive in original machine and attempted to boot up however before it managed to load up windows a blue screen flashed up and announced it was restating a reinstall of windows. I have at up to this point never tried to reinstall windows on this hard drive only a repair which was completed fine so I have no idea why this is occuring, I do not wish to reinstall windows as there is some vital data I need and programs I use on that hard drive, any help on this would be much appreciated,

by the way the computer is running xp pro.

Thx in advance for any help.

[S Templar]

Hi and welcome.
One thing that may be best to do first, is to return hard drive as a slave on the other Pc and backup any needed data etc externally..Cd..Flash drive etc.

Did you only change the boot.ini to not include safe mode?
If you return your hard drive the original system and undo any changes made and once it boots to safe mode choose System restore.

[PhilliePhan]

One thing that may be best to do first, is to return hard drive as a slave on the other Pc and backup any needed data etc externally..Cd..Flash drive etc.

I agree - That would definitely be my first step before trying anything else!

Safe mode via msconfig is becoming increasingly dangerous these days due to some malware wiping the safeboot registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\SafeBoot

And msconfig, as you noted, changes boot.ini - the only way I know to fix this is through the recovery console. Slaving the drive as you did was a great idea. I can't believe that never crossed my mind!

That said, I am not sure how to address the current issue. . . . However, in addition to what The Saint has posted, you might have a look at this link as your penultimate (next to last ) resort:

XP's No-Reformat, Nondestructive Total-Rebuild Option

Best Luck
PP

[eljay333]

Thanks for your help on this one guys. I ended up saving all data as suggested and doing a fresh install due to some time constraints. Still not sure why this error occured.

Thanks again

[S Templar]

Thanks for the update,good to know all is now ok.