vista help

[muddeprived]

Usually when a family member comes to me with a crashed computer, I can fix it and hardly ever fail not to. This time it's different. I can't figure this out.

My gf's sis has a Dell laptop with Windows Visa Home 32bit OS. She said she recently updated windows and when booting it up afterwards, windows would not load. What happens is it boots up to the windows loading bar and then the screen goes black like it's about to load windows login picture but stays black with a mouse curser. You can control the mouse but the screen is black and stays that way. Nothing else works. First thing that comes to mind is saving her 500+ pictures so I hook up her vista laptop to my xp desktop via usb but my computer isn't recognizing hers so that didn't work. Next I booted from the system cd that came with the laptop and it was a little bit different than what I was used to seeing with xp and earlier versions. It would boot up like normal windows but give you options to check for errors, perform system restore using a restore point, check memory, etc. I performed the error check and it came back with no errors. I tried restore point but no restore points were ever made. I did the memory check and zero errors. The only other option this cd allows me to do is reinstall windows from scratch and lose everything. That is the last thing I want to do AFTER i recover her files.

Normally windows boots from the cd and has the option of deleting/adding/modifying partitions and drives, repairing windows by reinstalling system files, or reinstalling windows from scratch. This cd does not allow me to repair windows which I know would probably fix this issue. From what I gather on google, I need the actual Windows Vista OS cd in order to perform these tasks like previous versions of windows. The OEM cd does not allow this. Now she does not want to pay $72 to buy windows Vista so I went online looking for a downloadable system cd or recovery cd and found some that allow you to make a recovery cd but the system will not boot from the cd's i make with these files.

Is there a way to repair Vista without having to buy the OS cd? She told me if she can save her 500+ pictures then I can just go ahead and reinstall Vista using the OEM cd but I can't seem to find a way to save the pictures.

Anyone got any ideas?

By the way, I hate vista lol.

Thanks

[bluedragon436]

Well when I have had similar issues after letting my Vista equipped Netbook update, I have unplugged anything plugged in and tried restarting it... it has worked a few of the times, and other times I have had to get it to start up in Safe Mode... at which time you would be able to grab her pics just in case you aren't able to get back to this point for whatever reasons... but once I got it to come up in safe mode, I went and checked the computer hardware listings in My Computer and found that there was an issue with one of the drivers for something on my laptop... don't remember what it is off hand... but after basically deleting the item, temporarily I restarted the netbook and it started up just fine... and was able to get a good driver for the item I had deleted before and it ran fine after that... Vista is stupid for stuff like that... that is the reason why I am still running XP on all of my other computers... (soon to be 7 Ultimate!!)

[muddeprived]

I forgot to mention that it will not boot up in any of the safe modes. :( It goes straight to the same black screen after the windows loading bar fades out.

[Mudderoy]

Usually when a family member comes to me with a crashed computer, I can fix it and hardly ever fail not to. This time it's different. I can't figure this out.

My gf's sis has a Dell laptop with Windows Visa Home 32bit OS. She said she recently updated windows and when booting it up afterwards, windows would not load. What happens is it boots up to the windows loading bar and then the screen goes black like it's about to load windows login picture but stays black with a mouse curser. You can control the mouse but the screen is black and stays that way. Nothing else works. First thing that comes to mind is saving her 500+ pictures so I hook up her vista laptop to my xp desktop via usb but my computer isn't recognizing hers so that didn't work. Next I booted from the system cd that came with the laptop and it was a little bit different than what I was used to seeing with xp and earlier versions. It would boot up like normal windows but give you options to check for errors, perform system restore using a restore point, check memory, etc. I performed the error check and it came back with no errors. I tried restore point but no restore points were ever made. I did the memory check and zero errors. The only other option this cd allows me to do is reinstall windows from scratch and lose everything. That is the last thing I want to do AFTER i recover her files.

Normally windows boots from the cd and has the option of deleting/adding/modifying partitions and drives, repairing windows by reinstalling system files, or reinstalling windows from scratch. This cd does not allow me to repair windows which I know would probably fix this issue. From what I gather on google, I need the actual Windows Vista OS cd in order to perform these tasks like previous versions of windows. The OEM cd does not allow this. Now she does not want to pay $72 to buy windows Vista so I went online looking for a downloadable system cd or recovery cd and found some that allow you to make a recovery cd but the system will not boot from the cd's i make with these files.

Is there a way to repair Vista without having to buy the OS cd? She told me if she can save her 500+ pictures then I can just go ahead and reinstall Vista using the OEM cd but I can't seem to find a way to save the pictures.

Anyone got any ideas?

By the way, I hate vista lol.

Thanks

The safest thing to do would be to remove the hard drive, install it in a working system and recover the data. If you can't do that then the next thing I would try would be to download a burn a LIVE CD. Like Ubuntu or Fedora Core. Boot the system from the LIVE CD and recover the files from the hard drive.

Anything you do is a potential loss of data. You may wish to have a professional recover your data before you go any further.

With that said I'll tell you this. There is NO WAY I would want to depend on a computer running Windows without a full OS CD. What make take hours to fix can be fixed in minutes with that CD.

[Tural]

fastest fix is slaving the hard drive from the laptop, recovering the useful files and documents, formatting the hard drive and starting over.

[muddeprived]

Just realized that I have an adapter to hook up the laptop's HD to my computer so I will use that to see if I can gain access to the files. I used it on my mom's desktop hard drive a couple months ago when it crashed and kinda forgot that I had it. It has sata/ide ports for both types.

[Mudderoy]

Just realized that I have an adapter to hook up the laptop's HD to my computer so I will use that to see if I can gain access to the files. I used it on my mom's desktop hard drive a couple months ago when it crashed and kinda forgot that I had it. It has sata/ide ports for both types.

Yeah I've been meaning to buy one of those usb/sata/ide drive enclosures just for things like this. Let us know how it works out.

[msmoorenburg]

I have one of the adapters and I love it. I've recovered numerous systems with it. Fyi if you run chkdsk on the vista disk that is slaved on a working system (vista or win 7) 80% of the time the boot sector and windows system files are recovered.


Good luck Vista is a turd

[muddeprived]

Yes I hate vista already and I have zero experience with the OE. :headshake:

I did manage to save all the important files using my adapter to hook up the laptop's HD to my PC so I'm good there. Now I just have to reinstall the HD and format it. Then I'll install windows vista again (unfortunately) for her so she can resume using the laptop for school purposes.

[Mudderoy]

Yes I hate vista already and I have zero experience with the OE. :headshake:

I did manage to save all the important files using my adapter to hook up the laptop's HD to my PC so I'm good there. Now I just have to reinstall the HD and format it. Then I'll install windows vista again (unfortunately) for her so she can resume using the laptop for school purposes.

Excellent! :patriot:

[Tural]

glad u got it going!

[muddeprived]

Thanks for the help guys.

My gf's sister bought a new hard drive for it (120 gig) but I told her the HD is fine, it was just the OS that was corrupted. So I recommended her to return the HD and exchange/buy an external HD that connects via USB so she can store a backup of her files in case this happens again.

[bluedragon436]

Glad to hear you guys got it up and going again... with no real loss in the end... other than still running Vista... I was going to mention the slaving idea... as that is what I would have done to at least get the info off the HD... but most people are leery about taking apart laptops and stuff like that... Yeah I would def. recommend her pick up an external HD and keep a copy of her pics and such.... (something I keep trying to remind myself to do on a regular basis... as I have lost many pics and such over the years to messed up HD's and corrupted OS's.... if nothing else keep the one she bought and just purchase a case for it...

[Mudderoy]

Glad to hear you guys got it up and going again... with no real loss in the end... other than still running Vista... I was going to mention the slaving idea... as that is what I would have done to at least get the info off the HD... but most people are leery about taking apart laptops and stuff like that... Yeah I would def. recommend her pick up an external HD and keep a copy of her pics and such.... (something I keep trying to remind myself to do on a regular basis... as I have lost many pics and such over the years to messed up HD's and corrupted OS's.... if nothing else keep the one she bought and just purchase a case for it...

I run Vista 32 bit on my workstation at work. I have rebooted it about 4 times in the last two years (LITERALLY!). I'd rather have Windows XP Pro, or Win 7 Pro but from a functional stand point I have had ZERO issues with Vista.

Remember the quality of your power (UPS is mandatory!), memory and hard drive will go a long LONG way to having a stable system.