Missing Start Files?

Hi, Someone at malwareremoval.com refered me to this sight. I normally keep my computer on all the time. When I do restart it, it has been having trouble booting and asks for the system disc. I can then insert the disc, ask it to do a repair, and then the computer will start fine for a while. As I said, I don't restart very often, so after a repair from the disc if may work great for 2 to 5 restarts over a time of 1 week to 6 or 8 weeks. Once it won't start back up once, it will not start again until it has the disc, so it is not random.. I had it checked for a virus that might do this and that was not it. Thank you in advance for any help. Shaun

Hi and


My first diagnostic approach would be to run your hard drive manufacturers diagnostic tool.

This will be a boot floppy or a boot ISO CD that you can download from the manufacturers web site.

If you do not know your manufacturer look in the Device Manager under Disk drives.

You can open the Device Manger by right clicking My Computer then click Manage then Device Manager.

If you do not have a floppy drive and are not familiar with ISO creation you can download this free ISO burner which will add the option to "Create Disk Image" to your right click menu or shell.

http://isorecorder.alexfeinman.com/isorecorder.htm


If your hard drive passes the manufacturers tests we can move on to the possible software issue of rebuilding your Boot sector.

Hi Jephree, I have a Seagate drive. It has a few different tests it can run: Short drive self test, Long drive self test, short generic, long generic, and an "advanced tests" . I ran the short and it passed. Is that good enough? Thanks for the help. Shaun

Hi Shaun,

That should be good for now. I would suggest running the System File Checker.

To do so open a Command prompt and type sfc /scannow

In Vista you need to "Run as Administrator".

You will probably be prompted after it starts to insert your System Disk.

I don't think it is going to let me do that. I opened the command prompt and typed what you said. It comes up with the "Please wait while windows verifies that all proteted windows files are intact and in their original versions." and then "files that are required for windows to run properly must be copied to the DLL Cache. Insert your Windows XP Home Edition CD-ROM now." I inserted the CD and clicked "retry", but it keeps going back to the "insert cd box. Also, when I click cancel on the "insert cd" in comes up with a box that says " if you cancel, windows might require you to insert a cd later. Are you sure you want to skip this file?" Yes or no. thanks, Shaun

Also, I ran the Long drive self test and it came back good as well.

Hi Jephree, I think I got it to work. I put the disc in my other drive. After it ran, it closed. It didn't give me anything to post or say that is was successful or failed. Thanks, Shaun

Hi Shaun, SFC will not post any results or logs. Only test is to see if your issue returns.

Hi Jephree, By closing after running does that mean the test went well or not? Is there anything else I should do? Thanks, Shaun

Hi Shaun, That is standard procedure for SFC to run and exit. It should have replaced any damaged or missing system files. The only real test of success is to see if your reboot issue persists.

Hi Jephree, What do you think the chance is for success? If it didn't work, do you think that means I have a bad board? Thanks for the help here and I will let you know in a few weeks if it seems to be working - it will take that long to confirm just waiting. Shaun

Hi Shaun,

From your symptoms the only hardware I originally questioned was your hard drive which apparently has passed all tests.

This leads me to suspect a Windows error. If the issue recurs we can rebuild your boot configuration via the Recovery Console which would be my next suggestion.

As to hardware the only other issue I could think of testing is your RAM. I'd suggest MemTest.

MemTest86+

An excellent MemTest86+ tutorial can be found here.


thanks Digerati