76 replies to this topic

[Adasha]

I just bought an Acer netbook and the owner had several partitions installed. I did a system recovery and when it rebooted I get a command prompt with this GRUB prompt. It had Windows 7 before. I have no flash or cd to reinstall anything. I have no other computers. How can I fix this back to windows from within?

[Lee]

I did a system recovery and when it rebooted I get a command prompt with this GRUB prompt. It had Windows 7 before.

Some important questions:
1. Does this an Acer Aspire netbook have a model number?
2. Did you actually see the W7 or were you just told it had W7?
3. For what reason did you do a system recovery if you already had W7 on the computer and in what way did you do it?
4. Does the netbook have a windows product key sticker on the base? It should say W7 and have a product key consisting of 5 lots of 5 numbers and letters.


With most Acers you press alt+f10 as soon as you turn the netbook on to access the recovery partition, which takes you back to factory default settings, is this what you did?

If the hard drive has several partitions, there is a good chance that the recovery partition might no longer be on the hard drive. A LInux distro was installed at some stage, possibly as a dual boot system but possibly only just Linux, as GRUB is a left over Linux boot loader.

PS edit:
I'm fairly certain that Aspire and ASUS netbooks were Linux based (hardware suited and would explain GRUB), never W7 (hardware not suited) and both companies are finished making them. They were just not competitive with the increasingly lower price of laptops with Windows OSs.

Cheers,
Lee

Edited by Lee, 28 February 2013 - 11:18 PM.

[Adasha]

1. Acer Aspire One model ZA3 2. When I'd boot, it had several choices to boot to, and I'd select Windows 7 and use it. It did system recovery when the monitor got flickery and troubleshooting didn't help. I did it fom control panel within windows. There's not a windows sticker on the bottom. I just bought this from someone, and while $100 may not be a lot, on a fixed income, it's one fourth of my income. I have to fix this.

[Adasha]

If I could just run windows on it, just guide me on how to do that.

[Lee]

Someone who knows just enough about computers to be dangerous, at some stage has installed W7 as a dual-boot along with the original Linux and accidentally or maybe deliberately, possibly wiped the recovery partition.

-----------------------------------------------------------
TRY:
To start the system recovery:
1. Restart the computer.
2. When the Acer logo appears on the screen, press the left Alt, and the F10 keys.
3. If you are prompted with a Microsoft Windows boot screen, press the Enter key.
4. After the Acer eRecovery Management application has loaded, select your restore type.
5. Read the notice, and then click Next when you are ready.
6. Click Next to begin the restore process. The restore can take anywhere from 10 minutes up to an hour.
7. Once the restore is complete your computer will reboot.

TRY:
1. Restart the computer.
2. When the Acer logo appears on the screen, press the F12 key repeatedly to enter the computer's Boot Menu.
3. Use the keyboard up and down arrows to select "last know good configuration" and then press ENTER.

If there is no response to either of the above, you have a serious problem which could be either hardware or software related.
---------------------------------------------------------------


Acer Aspire One model ZA3 (actually a re-badged early Aspire One AO751h).
This ZA3 netbook was released in 2009 and the hardware was never suited to W7, due to the lousy Intel Atom Z520 processor running at 1.33GHz and packing just 1GB of RAM. Later models came out with Windows XP but due to the GRUB bootloader and no Windows XP product code sticker, this one probably came out with Linux installed.

I'm not surprised you have had trouble with this netbook. No product key sticker and no disk, do suggest a possible hacked version of W7 was installed. Apart from the unsuitable hardware, another possible reason the OS went pear-shaped.

Have you contacted the person you purchased the netbook from about a possible refund? With no working USB, installing a LInux OS again or even XP if you have a disk, is just not possible. If you had a working USB and idealy a USB diskplayer you can borrow, you could get the netbook up and running again if the hard-drive and other hardware is OK.

The USB would have to be fixed before you can do anything and that would be throwing good money after bad, unless you can fix it yourself or know a friend who can.

Installing a hacked version of W7 onto an early laptop/netbook etc. is a well known selling ploy that makes the computer seem an attractive buy. With at least a genuine Windows XP (and some models of this netbook did come out with XP) and a working USB, it might have been a reasonable purchase, but not as is.

The best outcome here would be to try and get your money back

Never buy anything without a readable Windows product key sticker on it and at least one working USB.
Example:



Cheers,
Lee

Edited by Lee, 03 March 2013 - 04:18 PM.

[terry1966]

to lee i'm assuming it has a usb port, but how do you know it doesn't work? my opinion is it probably still works, unless i've missed something in the posts. to fix the op is definitely going to need the use of another pc and have a usb flash drive/stick/whateveryou want to call it, a 2gb one would do just fine, unless there's a lot of data that needs saving first then the bigger the better, unless we use the cloud to store the data to. use the other pc to download and create a bootable usb live os of choice, boot the live os on the netbook definitely don't make any changes to the hard drive or try to install anything at this point. examine the hard drive see what partitions and operating systems are on it and recover all data. for all we know the recovery partition is still there and it might even be for windows xp. once we know what partitions are there and what's on them, it should be easy enough to boot each one in turn using the live os and do a quick test of them.(be carefull booting the recovery partition, if there, it should start the recovery process/menu/options and we don't want to make any changes until everythings been saved and we've decided what's the best way forward) depending on what's found working we can either try a fix, like fixing grub or do a factory restore, etc. i don't have any systems set up for troubleshooting, at the moment and my memories not great so i can't remember exactly how to go about doing the things i've mentioned but if you need more suggestions i can always set something up and experiment to refresh my memory (re-learn in other words. ). to adasha don't give up on it just yet, with any luck lee and i working together will be able to get it up and running again.

Edited by terry1966, 03 March 2013 - 06:05 PM.

[Lee]

I just bought an Acer netbook and the owner had several partitions installed. I did a system recovery and when it rebooted I get a command prompt with this GRUB prompt. It had Windows 7 before.
I have no flash or cd to reinstall anything. I have no other computers.
How can I fix this back to windows from within?

Terry,

First Post: "I have no flash or cd to reinstall anything. I have no other computers". That's no flash or cd player working, unless Adasha means something else entirely (?)

I don't know about anywhere else, but here a flash player is a USB port and unless she wants to install a Linux disto (she wants a Windows OS it seems from a previous post) and providing she has a working USB and the hard-drive is OK, without a windows product key Adasha has a serious problem with that netbook.

Edited by Lee, 03 March 2013 - 06:12 PM.

[terry1966]

i took that to mean he had no install media on either a usb flash drive or cd to do a windows re-install with. does the netbook even have a cd drive? haven't tried to find it specs. it depends if the windows os already on there is still bootable or not and what is on the recovery partition(if any) agreed there's noway we can do a clean install of any windows os, but it might still be possible what's on there still works. worst case scenario is we can only put a linux os on it, but at least it will be something they can still use instead of junking it or until they can purchase a windows os to install onto it.

Edited by terry1966, 03 March 2013 - 06:20 PM.

[Lee]

No Terry, netbooks don't have CD player and so you don't get off on the wrong foot here, Adasha is a she, not a he

[terry1966]

sorry adasha.

was editing my post lee, you might have missed it so here it is again in full.

i took that to mean he had no install media on either a usb flash drive or cd to do a windows re-install with.

does the netbook even have a cd drive? haven't tried to find it specs.

it depends if the windows os already on there is still bootable or not and what is on the recovery partition(if any) agreed there's noway we can do a clean install of any windows os, but it might still be possible what's on there still works.

worst case scenario is we can only put a linux os on it, but at least it will be something they can still use instead of junking it or until they can purchase a windows os to install onto it.

popcorn.gif

[Lee]

Good going with the edit mate

Unless we hear otherwise, I think we can assume "no flash and no cd to reinstall anything" implies the meaning no cd player and no working USB, as it's in the same sentence, otherwise I don't think cd would have been mentioned at all if adasha was meaning install media .
Of course I might be wrong and the USB does work but from what I have read about Aspire netbooks, USBs not working seems a very common affliction so I don't have my hopes up, but we will know soon enough I guess.

With a working USB a Linux distro can installed and personnel data rescued ...as long as the bios has a 1st. boot from USB option (my computer doesn't and the motherboard is only 2yrs. old, not five.

No windows sticker (unless it was removed completely and I don't see the point of that), certainly implies that it never had a Windows OS at any time. The netbook never came out with W7 that's for sure. The existence of a GRUB bootloader implies that the original OS was a version of Linux as that's what they originally came out with.

[terry1966]

With a working USB a Linux distro can installed and personnel data rescued ...as long as the bios has a 1st. boot from USB option (my computer doesn't and the motherboard is only 2yrs. old, not five.

we don't want to install anything until we've discovered what's on the partitions and if they work when booted to or not, just use it as a live os and boot cd for the partitions..
don't remember if this is unique to imagewriter, but you don't need to have a boot usb option in the bios for it to work (well i've never come across a pc this method didn't work with.), just start the pc with the usb stick already plugged in and you will see it under hard drive options, i've used this method on a few pcs/laptops and at least 1 netbook in the past to repair them where they never had a boot usb option in the bios.
maybe you'd like to give it a try and test on your pc.
here's a link. :- http://en.opensuse.o...ws_Instructions

No windows sticker (unless it was removed completely and I don't see the point of that), certainly implies that it never had a Windows OS at any time. The netbook never came out with W7 that's for sure. The existence of a GRUB bootloader implies that the original OS was a version of Linux as that's what they originally came out with.

yes probably, i'm not sure if the windows key would have been stored on the motherboard in rom or something back then, and don't think we're allowed to advise how to obtain it from the hard drive, if even possible in this case.
so unless there is a working windows partition or a windows recovery partition then linux would be the only legal option for us, until they purchase a windows cd.

Edited by terry1966, 03 March 2013 - 11:55 PM.

[Lee]

don't remember if this is unique to imagewriter, but you don't need to have a boot usb option in the bios for it to work (well i've never come across a pc this method didn't work with.), just start the pc with the usb stick already plugged in and you will see it under hard drive options, i've used this method on a few pcs/laptops and at least 1 netbook in the past to repair them where they never had a boot usb option in the bios.
maybe you'd like to give it a try and test on your pc.

I have Slako Puppy on a bootable USB that I have used on a few Laptops with a bios USB boot option, I just tried it on my PC and It didn't work I'm afraid. It didn't work on Zoe's (wife) PC either. I have an AMD motherboard and Zoe has an Intel.

Considering the Aspire netbook doesn't have a CD drive, there is a possibility that it does have a bios USB 1st boot option. That would be a sensible feature!

However, everything is a mute point if there is no working USB.

[Adasha]

To maybe clear up some points, I just got it, so I have nothing on it to back up. No data or personal anything. I had not even tested the USB but have no reason to think it doesn't work. I now have someone willing to let me download something on their laptop to a flash drive if that will help. I just can't purchase anything. I said I need windows, because I've never even heard of Linux. Not sure I'd know how to work it? I tried the f10 and I only get grub error. I'll try f12 but suspect the same outcome.

[Lee]

Thank you Adasha for clearing up several points, especially about the USB port, which we are going to assume for the moment, works. If you were unable to enter the boot menu (F12) nor access Recovery Management (F10) with the methods outline in post #5, then unless the Hard-drive has failed, your netbook probably has no recovery partition. Please confirm you actually had W7 on the computer. Meaning you saw it boot to W7 desktop, not just a W7 boot option, which by itself does not mean that W7 is even on the hard-drive. If it did for sure boot to the W7 desktop, hopefully it is a legal copy and we will try to rescue that from the USB if possible. If it is a hacked version of W7 though, we will be wasting our time as it will probably be unstable, unusable or very quickly become so. If there is no usable W7 on the hard-drive, your only option is to install a version of a Linux operating system (free), fairly easy to use and as to which version and what to do with it, I will leave to Terry as he is the Linux expert here, not I. The first thing we need to do is to get into the Aspire's BIOS. Setting the boot order so that USB is first boot and accesses whats on the USB thumb drive when you boot-up, not the hard drive. Your BIOS might not have that option choice, but Terry has some knowledge I don't have about getting the computer to boot from USB anyway it seems. So firstly try the F12 method to access the boot menu. If successful, use your up and down arrows to select "last known good configeration" and press ENTER which will activate W7 system restore and hopefully return you to W7. If this fails re-boot and immediately start pressing F2 about once a second. This will take you into the bios. If F2 does not work try the same method but using the Delete button. Not all BIOS look the same but the steps bellow and intuition should complete the task. 1. Use the arrow keys to highlight Boot Order heading (or something similar) at the top of the page. 2. Press ENTER to enter boot order page 3. Use the arrow keys again to highlight "USB/External Device" (or something similar) 4. Press the "+/=" key to move "USB/External Device" to the top of the Boot Order list 5. Press ENTER to accept and set the changes and then "escape" which will take you back to the main BIOS screen 6. Now you need to notice which key the BIOS says to press to keep changes and exit BIOS. See how you go up to this point and then we can move on to a USB stick and what to put on it. Cheers, Lee

Edited by Lee, 04 March 2013 - 02:47 PM.