Problem Re-setting Dell Lappy

senordingdong

Upon start up it tells me that yadda yadda was interupted and asks do I want to run start up repair or start windows normally.

Now, starting windows normally does nothing as it will not load, and when I try to run start up repair, I get hit with a blue screen which reads....
'STOP: c000021a {fatal system error}
The session manager failed to create protected prefixes system process terminated unexpectedly with a status of 0xc000003a (0x00000000 0x00000000)
The system has been shut down'

I turned it on again and tried to re-boot it through the options I get by pressing F2 on start up. But when I hit the 'Load defaults' button, it says even if you hit this, it won't matter unless you save before you exit'.

But I can't for the life of me find the save option.

Can anyone shed any light on either of these?

fintonie

to restore to factory settings, hit the f8 on start up,

select repair your computer,

pick English for language settings,

then hit dell factory image restore,

select yes, reformat hard drive and restore system software to factory condition,

wait for it to finish.

I had to do this, if you can get back in to backup info you require do so,

as for me it would not let me backup so I had to perform the above, but my dell is working at the moment,,

for how long I don't know, it took about 15/20 mins.

senordingdong

Thanks cheif.

There is some stuff I'd love to save but how do I get in there to save it?
Is there another way in?

Tony H

any linux live cd will get you access to your data , ubuntu is probably the easiest to use
http://www.ubuntu.com/GetUbuntu/download

fintonie

senordingdong wrote: »

Thanks cheif.

There is some stuff I'd love to save but how do I get in there to save it?
Is there another way in?

well for me no,, once it got to the main screen it froze, it would not let me perform system restore,

so after checking it out I had to do the restore to factory settings, now I think I could of sent it to dell but I was not prepared to wait for 4/6 weeks without me lappie,

even at that if you sent it to get fixed there is no guarantee they will not replace the hard drive.

senordingdong

Yeah, that's true.

Well thanks for the input lads.

Fysh

Depending on what you want to recover a WinPE bootable disc might do the trick. Google BartPE if you're comfortable creating your own image and have a windows install disc handy. -snip mod edit - these options will create a bootable cd which gets you to a basic version of a windows xp desktop where you can look for files you want to save and copy them to a pendrive or external hard drive.

In terms of the "load defaults" thing you mentioned, I presume that was in the BIOS, yeah? You should be able to save the changes in there with F10.

You should try the "last known good configuration" option when booting windows as well.

senordingdong

fintonie wrote: »

to restore to factory settings, hit the f8 on start up,

select repair your computer,

pick English for language settings,

then hit dell factory image restore,

select yes, reformat hard drive and restore system software to factory condition,

wait for it to finish.

I had to do this, if you can get back in to backup info you require do so,

as for me it would not let me backup so I had to perform the above, but my dell is working at the moment,,

for how long I don't know, it took about 15/20 mins.

I hit F8 but am getting a different selection than what you've described.

Repair your computer (doesn't seem to work)
Safe mode (doesn't seem to work)
Safe mode w/ networking (doesn't seem to work)
Safe mode w/ command prompt (doesn't seem to work_
Enable boot logging (doesn't seem to work)
Enable low resolution video (haven't tried)
Last known good configuration (doesn't seem to be working)
Directory services restore mode (doesn't seem to be working)
Debugging mode ('' '')
Disable automatic restart on system failure ('' '')
Disable driver signature enforcement (haven't tried)
Start windows normally (doesn't seem to work)

I can see which ones I am supposed to try but they don't seem to go anywhere...they don't freeze up but it's like they don't work or something.

fintonie

what dell machine do you have.

senordingdong

Inspiron 1525 running vista.

fintonie

senordingdong wrote: »

Inspiron 1525 running vista.

try this its all here hope it works out for you.


http://support.dell.com/support/topics/global.aspx/support/dsn/document?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&docid=3E48AE3870775D64E040A68F5B2877D4&journalid=60AAF1DBF91E40A0E040AE0AB5E10DC3&Query=&SystemID=&ServiceTag=&contenttype=&os=&component=&lang=&doclang=&toggle=&dl=

fintonie

also you might get something here.

http://search.dell.com/results.aspx?k=restore+to+factory+settings+1525&rf=all&cat=sup&s=gen&c=us&l=en&subcat=&evl=

Fysh

Do you have a vista installation disc? The repair utilities on the disc may sort you out even if the startup repair option doesn't work

senordingdong

Yeah, I hit the repair computer option, then I got a windows loading bar for about a minute, (language selection never came) now I've had an empty black screen since then, that was about twenty minutes ago.

Thanks anyway folks.

Alanstrainor

Moved from Laptops.

senordingdong

Fysh wrote: »

Do you have a vista installation disc? The repair utilities on the disc may sort you out even if the startup repair option doesn't work

Popped it in and sure enough it sorted her out and she's as right as rain again.
I'll never know what casued it though.

Thank for that Fysh.

Fysh

senordingdong wrote: »

Popped it in and sure enough it sorted her out and she's as right as rain again.
I'll never know what casued it though.

Thank for that Fysh.

If you want to get to the bottom of it you can root around in the Event Viewer - right-click on My Computer, select Manage, then go to Windows Logs > System (the names may be slightly different, I can never remember which ones are for Vista and which are for XP).

The other thing is that you may have received Vista SP2 (or other patches) via Automatic Updates on Tuesday. I've seen a few machines go pearshaped after getting SP2 via auto-updates, but oddly enough it's usually been fine when installing it manually.

senordingdong

Great stuff.

Thanks again.

senordingdong

Well a month later the problem has come back except this time start up repair won't fix anything.
I tried to reboot but it crashed to a blue screen when I tried it. Now upon start up, after the Dell logo all I get is a black screen with a flashing underscore in the top left corner.

Also, I can no longer access the menu by pressing f8 upon startup. I can access f2 & f12 still but when I try to restore factory settings through f2 it won't allow me to save these settings.
Any advice?

Fysh

If you can't get past the Dell logo it sounds like a BIOS/hardware issue. On the other hand, the flashing cursor in the top left hand corner is reminiscent of a system that's got nothing available to boot from. Can you boot from CDs or DVDs?

If you can get a linux live disc or a WinPE disc to boot, you'd at least know that it's not the board or BIOS itself that's dead; at that point you'd be looking at a problem with the drive itself (either physical, ie disk controller dead, or logical, ie something up with the partition or data on it).

senordingdong

That would seem to be tha case.

It can boot from a cd when I manually access this option through F2 or F12 but start up repair and factory restore have no results.
Unfortunately, I don't have a Linux disc.
So it seems to be a hardware problem then, how can I be sure?

Capt'n Midnight

senordingdong wrote: »

Well a month later the problem has come back except this time start up repair won't fix anything.
I tried to reboot but it crashed to a blue screen when I tried it. Now upon start up, after the Dell logo all I get is a black screen with a flashing underscore in the top left corner.

Also, I can no longer access the menu by pressing f8 upon startup. I can access f2 & f12 still but when I try to restore factory settings through f2 it won't allow me to save these settings.
Any advice?

sounds like partition table / boot sector problem

you could try recovery console and fixboot , reboot , if not work then console and fixmbr

Fysh

What Capt'n Midnight said, basically. More info on using the Recovery Console for this sort of thing can be found here.

senordingdong

Fysh wrote: »

What Capt'n Midnight said, basically. More info on using the Recovery Console for this sort of thing can be found here.

Ok everything captain midnight went over my head.
Is ru nning the fixboot going on the assumption that it's no longer a hardware problem and that it's a software problem?

Fysh

Ah. Basically the Captain is suggesting that it's not a physical problem but a logical one, either with the bootsector of the disk (Identifies the details of the OS on the drive so that it can boot) or the partition table (describes how the disc has been partitioned and formatted to any OS trying to read the data on the drive).

The fix he describes should resolve any issue with your bootsector. Am posting from my phone now so can't check but I think you should be able to fix partition table problems with something like GParted (another bootable linux-type disc)

senordingdong

Yeah I'm on a poxy iPhone, it's a pain.

Ok I've entered the bootrec command bit from there it doesn't explain how I initiate any of the repairs, it just lists the four different types.

How do I run fix boot?

Fysh

Type in "bootrec /RebuildBcd" at the command prompt, then reboot once it finishes.