26 replies to this topic

[jobe]

hi and exellent website a newbie here and very basic in my comp knowledge so i am wondering if any one can help me please.
basically i have a toshiba note book with no cd drive i turned it on the other day and it wont boot up it gives me option on f2 and f8 and f 12 but it wont let me boot in safe mode or back to last known good configaration?it just loads and sticks on xp start screen?
i have tried every thing i down loaded a xp cd but it wont load from external cd drive?i am lost and have no idea how to approach this now any help or any more info you need i will gratefully provided many many thanks in advance guys and girls .

Edited by jobe, 05 October 2010 - 11:30 AM.

[amalux]

If you had a USB boot disk you could use it to get in and backup/restore etc. (probably for next time); you can take out the hard drive (easy) and with USB adapter hook it up to another PC. You can try a factory restore, usually F8 or F10 at startup or maybe hold down 0 key at startup (toshiba's are quirky) but this will wipe all data and restore to factory defaults.

[jobeagain]

hi again sorry i had to register again for some reason it kept saying boot land has no members called jobe and wont let me log in?
many thanks for replyin its much appricicated could you please tell me how i get a usb boot to boot my comp up?any links or walk throughs would be good ?
i am going to by a caddy to transfer my hard drive stuff to another comp so i can do that but im stuck on how to get the usb boot thingy where do i get on e and what is it called many thanks yet again and sorry to bother you all again
jobe
ps can i transfer all my hard drive stuff without removing the hard drive ?and is there a link on here to a usb boot drive for a toshiba note book?thanks

[al_jo]

i have tried every thing i down loaded a xp cd but it wont load from external cd drive?

Are you sure the CD is bootable?
If it is, can you manage to get into the BIOS and choose your external CD-drive?
Do you have XPsp1, 2 or 3? Home or Pro?

How to make a bootable USB-drive help here:
http://sites.google.com/site/rmprepusb

[jobeagain]

Are you sure the CD is bootable?
If it is, can you manage to get into the BIOS and choose your external CD-drive?
Do you have XPsp1, 2 or 3? Home or Pro?

How to make a bootable USB-drive help here:
http://sites.google.com/site/rmprepusb

hi its xp service 3 i have tried to make external drive as main boot up but it just whirs and goes back to main xp screen and keeps loading
?
im realy confused i havce tried and can get in bios via f2 and set the boot as external but to n o avail

[al_jo]

It seems that your XP-CD is not bootable.
Can you “see” what’s on the CD in another PC?
Have you tried another Live-bootable-CD/DVD?

[amalux]

Hi jobe (again)

If you can magage to get working ISOs from any of the projects here, you can setup a bootable UFD (USB Flash Drive) in this way:

Download Make USB tool here and use it to format your UFD (NTFS), this will wipe all data but is a required step (even if new or already formatted).


Download G4d-UFD setup here and extract files to root of formatted UFD. This will add files to make the UFD bootable, including grldr, boot.ini and a menu.lst like this:

color blue/black yellow/black white/black black/magenta
timeout 10
default 0

title W7PEX Rescue
find --set-root --ignore-floppies --ignore-cd /W7PEX.ISO
uuid ()
map /W7PEX.ISO (0xff)
map --hook
root (0xff)
chainloader (0xff)

title LiveXP Rescue
find --set-root --ignore-floppies /LiveXP.iso
map /LiveXP.iso (0xff)
map --hook
root (0xff)
chainloader (0xff)

title Recovery Console
find --set-root /cmdcons/setupldr.bin
chainloader /cmdcons/setupldr.bin
write 0x7C03 0x63646D63
write 0x7C07 0x00736E6F

title MemTest86+
kernel /memtest.bin

title Floppy (fd0)
chainloader (fd0)+1
rootnoverify (fd0)

title CommandLine
commandline

title Reboot
reboot

title shutdown
halt

The two ISO entries, LiveXP and W7PEX are keyed to projects in the tutorial link but can be adjusted for other projects; if you change the default ISO names, remember to adjust the two locations in each ISO menu entry to reflect the change. When you have the finished ISOs, just copy them to the root of the UFD along with the other files supplied. You now have a bootable USB flash drive, remember the PC must be setup to boot to USB; there should be an entry in the boot options menu (F8) or you'll have to check BIOS setup (F2) for available options.

Hope it helps, let me know if you have questions

[jobeagain]

i would just like to say i have never been treated to so much help by caring and help full people on this site you are a credit sirs to freindship im am overjoyed at the response once again many thanks for all your sites help and a special mention to amalux god bless you you are a star.

I am going to try to get all this info and make a boot usb i will let you know how i go on thanks once again.

[amalux]

You're very welcome, let us know how it goes

[jobeagain]

hi when i formatt my ufd i get a warning change boot sector
yes=change boot sector to ntldr type for boot ini menu
no=keep vista bootmgr boot sector for boot mgr?

its not my comp i am using and i dont want to break it so what do i do will effect this compi am using make it run slow or crashing?thanks for any help

i pressed no and it asked if i wanted to carry on i pressed yes at the end i got a error c\user\sammy\appdata\local\temp\rarsfxo\makebt\bootsect.exe?
ihave i done something worng or is this normal when i pressed ok it says end of progrm ok succes?
i am not sure what i do now?

[ceehoppy]

If you are using Make usb/Grub4dos to format your UFD, MAKE SURE YOU SELECT THE CORRECT DRIVE- you can wipe out the system hdd. As I remember, it gives you a small scroll down menu (hd0, hd1, etc.) You have to find the UFD based on drive size, format, then add grub MBR.

[amalux]

hi when i formatt my ufd i get a warning change boot sector
yes=change boot sector to ntldr type for boot ini menu
no=keep vista bootmgr boot sector for boot mgr?

its not my comp i am using and i dont want to break it so what do i do will effect this compi am using make it run slow or crashing?thanks for any help

i pressed no and it asked if i wanted to carry on i pressed yes at the end i got a error c\user\sammy\appdata\local\temp\rarsfxo\makebt\bootsect.exe?
ihave i done something worng or is this normal when i pressed ok it says end of progrm ok succes?
i am not sure what i do now?

Sorry, busy day at work...

Yes, please confirm you are formatting the correct drive!!! or do nothing until sure. The nice thing about Make_USB tool is that you can see the real drive letters and confirm size etc.


It worries me you get that warning, hopefully you didn't format the wrong drive, yikes!

--
I realize it's finally happened to me that I take certain things for granted having done this for so long... I need to add a boilerplate warning to any computer repair advice I give. Something like:

Warning: when working on computers, you are always one click away from total disaster! If you are not 100% certain the effect your actions will cause, DO NOTHING!! Wait, research more and ask questions until sure; well, you can never be sure so always backup your system with a good, reliable hard drive imaging tool like Acronis, Ghost, DriveImageXML etc. before attempting any repair on your system.

[jobeagain]

hi everybody just a realy quick up date yes i am back up and running thanbk you all so much for helping me i didnt loose any pics or documents and i have 2 stunning screen savers added from the files i downloaded once again many thanks for all your help and taking the time to look at this thread amalux a special mention to you i wish you all the luck in the world because you deserve it and with out you i wuold have gave up ages ago thank you my friend,,
ps i am realy happy so when i boot my comp up do i need to leave my ufd in every time?its no inconvience but just wondered tahnks again bye and i will be a regular user on the best site on the net

[Wonko the Sane]

ps i am realy happy so when i boot my comp up do i need to leave my ufd in every time?its no inconvience but just wondered tahnks again bye and i will be a regular user on the best site on the net

Easy test:

• Switch PC off
• remove the USB stick
• if it boots, OK
• if it doesn't, post describing what happens and someone will be able to help you fix it (rest assured it is easily fixable ).

Wonko

[jobeagain]

ok here goes with ufd out
1st it takes a bit to load the screen is black for approx 45 seconds
2a bar whips across the bottom like a loading bar
3rd the windows xp logo comes on
4th i get a blue message checking file system on c
one of your discs need to be checked for consistency and its recomended windows will now check the disk ,chkdsk is veryfying files 9stage 1 of 3)it runs for a few mins then says file record segment 22988 is unreadable and just sticks?
i then turn off and ignore the above disk scan to see if this helps i press a key to skip disk checking the it says windows starting up the a welcome sign comes on and stays on and the comp does nothing ?any ideas please?thank you in advance

[PaPeuser]

YES backup that Hard Drive right away..!!!!!!!!
Buy a new drive..

Hopefully you can Ghost old drive to a new one, and at least save the recovery partition and some if not all your data.. But if your old drive is failing, the more you boot, mess with it the more it MAY fail.. so depending on how important your info is ALWAYS back up a drive before you work on it.

[jobeagain]

YES backup that Hard Drive right away..!!!!!!!!
Buy a new drive..

Hopefully you can Ghost old drive to a new one, and at least save the recovery partition and some if not all your data.. But if your old drive is failing, the more you boot, mess with it the more it MAY fail.. so depending on how important your info is ALWAYS back up a drive before you work on it.

ok thanks i will so if i get a hard drive all i do is put it in and will my comp then start?#or do i have to install windows xp?
and what is ghost the drive
?
thanks

[PaPeuser]

ok thanks i will so if i get a hard drive all i do is put it in and will my comp then start?#or do i have to install windows xp?
and what is ghost the drive
?
thanks

You will need to reload a new drive,, if your laptop came with a disk to reload WinXP then you can use that
if your computer did not come with a recovery disk and has a recovery partition then you may have to GHost or copy old drive to new one.

Good luck,,,,

[jobeagain]

You will need to reload a new drive,, if your laptop came with a disk to reload WinXP then you can use that
if your computer did not come with a recovery disk and has a recovery partition then you may have to GHost or copy old drive to new one.

Good luck,,,,

ok thanbks i will by a sata drive and put that in i have the xp restore disc so hopefully that will do...bit gutted tho but its worth it if i can get it going again silly question will any sata internal hard drive fit my comp or does it have to be a toshiba one as long is its 2.5
?

[PaPeuser]

ok thanbks i will by a sata drive and put that in i have the xp restore disc so hopefully that will do...bit gutted tho but its worth it if i can get it going again silly question will any sata internal hard drive fit my comp or does it have to be a toshiba one as long is its 2.5
?

Most replacement drives should be ok,,, BUT I would check out Toshiba website just to be sure, When you visit Toshiba website also check how big a drive you can use in that laptop. then price a few HD's

[amalux]

Hi jobeagain

Glad you've had success with UFD

As stated, make a backup image of your existing hard drive with software of choice (Acronis TrueImage, Symantec Ghost, DriveImage etc.); I use TrueImage so I'll give you quick walk through:

Backup
1) Start program from shortcut on desktop.
2) Choose 'Backup' from main screen.
3) Choose 'Entire disk contents or partition'.
4) Select the drive (partition) to backup (usually C: and only one with primary/active flag). If this isn't clear, ask about it and I'll explain better.
5) Select the backup archive location
This can be any fixed or removable drive with enough space to hold the backup (about 1/3 total size of drive your backing up used space). Normally this could be a separate partition on the same hard drive but since this drive is failing, better to select location on UFD, USB-HD, DVD etc. It's a good idea to save a backup to removable media anyway just in case your HD fails
6) Select 'Create new full backup archive'
Use default options and confirm 'from' and 'to file' are as expected etc.
7) Proceed! Starts backup and progress bar; shows 'successfully completed' dialog when done.

So now you have a backup image file, confirm you can find it and it's where it's supposed to be (not on your internal hard drive).

Now you can shut down PC, remove old hard drive (save it for now) and plug in new. Boot again to your UFD boot disk, use standard tools to create a new primary/active partition on the new hard drive's unpartitioned space* (ask if you need help) and use TrueImage to restore your backup image to this new drive. *If you are using the whole drive (not multiple partitions) you can skip this setup as TrueImage will allow restore to unpartitioned space of any size.

Recovery
1) Choose 'Recovery' from main screen.
2) Select archive location to restore, this is the backup image file you created earlier.
3) Select Restore disks or partitions option (default).
4) Select C: (assuming C: was the drive you backed up)
5) Select the 'restored partition location' (highlight the drive).
This is the new primary/active partition you created on the new hard drive (should be C:) or if whole drive then only one option.
6) Should default to 'Active'.
7) If new partition larger, adjust to fill empty space (drag bar or set 'free space after' to 0 bytes)
8) Choose 'Yes, I want to assign a logical drive letter to restored partition' C: (default).
9) Next option should default to 'No, don't restore another partition...'
10) Use default options and confirm 'From file:' (your backup image file you made), 'deleting partition' and 'restoring partition' should both be C:
11) Proceed! Starts restore process with progress bar and shows 'successfully completed' dialog when done.

Best of luck and ask questions if needed.

[Wonko the Sane]

As stated, make a backup image of your existing hard drive with software of choice (Acronis TrueImage, Symantec Ghost, DriveImage etc.); I use TrueImage so I'll give you quick walk through:

Unfortunately, it WON'T most probably work.

Right now the filesystem of the old HD seems like corrupted and NOT repairable from Command Console (Autocheck/checkNTFS).
The NTFS volume has a dirty bit that forces the repair and if the repair is skipped, the volume does not work.

BEFORE imaging a corrupted filesystem with Acronis or any similar utiliies, that are VERY likely to either FAIL or produce an equally corrupted copy of the filesystem, it is advised to use a "specific" app for the imaging.

The theoretical approach would be that of imaging the drive with a "dd-like" kind of app (or a forensically sound one) and attempt repairing the filesystem on the image.

A suitable app for the imaging is this one:
http://www.boot-land...?showtopic=7783


Wonko

[amalux]

Wonko's right, of course, if the OS is damaged a backup won't fix it . All the more reason to make a backup when things are working good! Remember this when you're up and running again (with new OS setup), make a backup before you need it!!

If it's still possible to explore the drive from PE (UFD boot disk etc.), try to save any documents, pictures etc. you can to safe place; this may avoid using more complicated tools for recovery. You can use the UFD boot disk to install a fresh OS on a new hard drive if your CD/DVD drive is not working

[jobeagain]

Unfortunately, it WON'T most probably work.

Right now the filesystem of the old HD seems like corrupted and NOT repairable from Command Console (Autocheck/checkNTFS).
The NTFS volume has a dirty bit that forces the repair and if the repair is skipped, the volume does not work.

BEFORE imaging a corrupted filesystem with Acronis or any similar utiliies, that are VERY likely to either FAIL or produce an equally corrupted copy of the filesystem, it is advised to use a "specific" app for the imaging.

The theoretical approach would be that of imaging the drive with a "dd-like" kind of app (or a forensically sound one) and attempt repairing the filesystem on the image.

A suitable app for the imaging is this one:
http://www.boot-land...?showtopic=7783


Wonko

thanks once again i have a 500gb extenal hd so i cut all my files and pasted therm on to that i saved my pics and desk top also ...so i am going to buy a 2.5 sata hd and replace my old one i have the recovery disc in the notebook box so in theory i should be able to put my hd in and use my external cd drive to install my operating system??i think thats how i do it?
i can buy one cheap but i will have to but the system on it and my xp recovery will do that also i have been offered a copy of xp pro to put on it?one last thing when i first posted i stated that it wouldnt boot from cd?will it boot with my new hard drive in???thanks yet again

[amalux]

one last thing when i first posted i stated that it wouldnt boot from cd?will it boot with my new hard drive in???thanks yet again

Since you can obviously boot to USB on this machine, an external CD drive should work. It's better to copy contents of CD to another drive and use your boot disk to install new OS, WinNTSetup or the old XPSetupLauncher work well for this.  XPSetupLauncher.zip   317.25KB   397 downloads

--
Also, if the notebook has 'Factory Restore' option (can't remember what you said), that would be a simple solution as well