Dual Boot Disaster (All Guru's plz HELLPPP)

Discussion in 'Windows 7' started by PSYB0RG, Mar 14, 2010.

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  1. PSYB0RG

    PSYB0RG MDL Junior Member

    Sep 11, 2009
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    Before I start, I'd like to politely ask that you all forgive my noobness. I have MESSED up really bad I believe. I have a Dell Inspiron 530 stock pc for the most part. It came with vista home/basic ed. When I first got it, I wiped it clean, and did a fresh install of Vista ult. I havent used any cracks/mods, a really smart friend showed me a technique to get it fully activated using some strange commands that I've never seen before on this site or any other site for that matter.

    Last year, when an official W7 was released, I split my harddrive and made a 2nd partition, installing w7, and I used either Haz/Daz loader, and everything was perfect. Both systems intact, and running flawlessly.

    3 days ago, due to wanting to use more space for w7, I tried to splice the backend of vista, oh wait, to string you all along, my setup was C:vista (116gb) H:w7 (116gb) on 1 actual harddrive,

    but i tried to splice maybe 50gb off vista, and attach it to the back of W7, making it 156gb. I tried this from within Vista since this is how I made the partition for W7 to begin with. When it shut down, and rebooted, my screen was black for maybe 30 minutes, I thought that maybe in that mode (thats doing the splitting & joining the new space) that maybe it didnt recognize my monitor (42in plazma), so i waited another 15 minutes, and thought that something got hung up somewhere, so like a MAJOR IDIOT, I thought I was unpluging my monitor power cord, to use my other monitor to see if it would pick up the signal, but it was actually my PC CORD i unplugged, resulting in me interrupting that process.

    I panicked, plugged it back in, and neither one of my OS's would boot. I think it was saying something about memtest not working, and it kept doing chkdsk operations, and it removed ALOT of stuff, I cant recall it though. After spending a day trying to figure out what was wrong, somehow, I managed to get Vista to run. After that, I went to Sprint website to download a tool to flash my phone, and everything was out of whack again.

    Somewhere in the above process, I also, in regedit, changed the drive paths from C to Q (q wasnt in use) then H to C, then Q to H, thinking im swapping everything around the opposite way (C: w7, H: Vista). Yea, I know, absolutely freaking STOOOPPPIIDDD!

    Then, I used a boot cd, (in an attempt to try to save an image of everything), I cut the back off of vista (since the above method didnt work) to have some more free space so i can save one of the OS's, and formated the new partition to NTFS, and tried to COPY vista there, but it wouldnt allow me to do that.

    Then, I accidentally made D: W7 a logical disk. And in the middle of that operation, I aborted (since I was in VIRTUAL MODE and none of the changes would take effect until after i rebooted). Well, after I rebooted, my D: w7 is a RAW partition. Which I need really bad, because I have a ton of COURT DOCUMENTS on both, although on vista those are old, but I still need them, but my primary & critical stuff is on my W7.

    What makes matters even worse is that, I couldnt even install a new copy of W7 (on the freed partition I tried to copy vista to), it just hangs at boot CD:, not only that, but if I dont have no disks in, it still hangs at Boot CD:, and right under that, it has the letter "J",

    And when I was able to get to at the screen to select which OS to boot, both would tell me /system32/winload.exe is corrupted. This is about all I can remember. I had finally made my mind up that, it looks like i have to do the obvious, START OVER FROM SCRATCH, and I should boot into something like a mini OS like XP, and salvage what I can. Only problem is, I didnt really want to use loaders/activators, as I was intending to learn more about slic 2.1 & the other special mod to allow for overclocking.

    So, if any of you Guru's can find it in your heart to tolerate my noobness, I will greatly appreciate it. And of this moment, I will be GLUED to this thread to reply quickly as possible to resolve this. Thanks
     
  2. PSYB0RG

    PSYB0RG MDL Junior Member

    Sep 11, 2009
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    One other thing I should point out, there was maybe 3 times that I did boot into W7, and the whole screen was blue, and at the bottom right hand corner, said "seven isnt a legit copy", and I could click on anything normally, only way around it was to use "right click" and open. The start menu was plain, everything was plain, and it said that the user acct that im on will not save any changes.

    And a few times i tried to run bootrec/ fixmbr, fixboot, it said it was successful but didnt do anything, only command i could never get to work was chkdsk /r: I saw that somewhere, but didnt understand it quite fully so I tried
    chkdsk C: /r
    chkdsk /R: C:
    nothing worked.
     
  3. PSYB0RG

    PSYB0RG MDL Junior Member

    Sep 11, 2009
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    yes, i've used the win7 boot cd (not the orig because it doesnt work) but a erd custom boot cd, that I think microsoft just released recently. and so far nothing worked, startup repair, and a few other option there.

    with the "test disk", do i burn this to cd? because i dont have a usb drive to put it on.
     
  4. WinFLP

    WinFLP MDL Senior Member

    Nov 18, 2009
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    Testdisk is a Windows application. So it must be run from within a Windows installation, which includes WinPE (like the Win7 DVD and ERD), and BartPE (like UBCD4WIN).

    USB drives start at less than $10, and some companies give them away as promotional items. I HIGHLY recommend them over floppies.
     
  5. PSYB0RG

    PSYB0RG MDL Junior Member

    Sep 11, 2009
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    im using testdisk, but it doesnt allow me to copy stuff to my extra partition. so far, im using a partition manager which allows me to mount my "unformatted partition" (ruined win 7), and im currently copying data to another hard drive. Only problem with this is, it will not allow me access to in "docs & settings" folder

    anybody know a better alternative. after im done copying what i can, i then plan to go back in test disk, and try to copy it then (earlier when I tried, my other external hard drives were not attached) hopefully this works
     
  6. venu

    venu MDL Addicted

    Oct 16, 2009
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    #7 venu, Mar 16, 2010
    Last edited: Mar 16, 2010
    Download Knoppix. Its a linux distro that you can run from a cd. You can boot from it and recover data. Has saved my back in acouple of situations.
     
  7. PSYB0RG

    PSYB0RG MDL Junior Member

    Sep 11, 2009
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    Ok, im doin that as well. Not familiar with linux at all, but hey, at this point, i will try ANYTHING!! Thanx 4 the tips so far everyone, and I welcome more.

    Since im trying to recover my data from this boot cd (mini xp), does anyone know how to access folders that are locked? I cant get into My DOCS & SETTINGS, pictures, videos, ect.
     
  8. woebetide

    woebetide MDL Member

    May 28, 2007
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    #9 woebetide, Mar 16, 2010
    Last edited: Mar 16, 2010
    Documents and Settings in both Vista and Windows 7 is not a real folder. It is a junction and used to interface Windows 7 with legacy programs. Windows 7 uses
    C:\Users\<your user name>\ to contain your files.

    So, Documents and Settings is actually a link to another folder Users in your system drive.
    Under Users, you will find everything........ so copy that folder !!!
     
  9. PSYB0RG

    PSYB0RG MDL Junior Member

    Sep 11, 2009
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    I tried but to no avail. I even tried again in test disk, but when it copied the folders (pics, vids, etc) the folder was EMPTY. I know that thats impossible. If those folders were empty, I wouldve been deleted those ruined partitions and started over from scratch, lol.

    I seen an option to do a "deeper search" but its never available for the Win 7 partition. Thanks for trying to help tho. If anything else comes to mind, feel free to fire away, Im all ears.
     
  10. Ev1lM0nk3y

    Ev1lM0nk3y MDL Senior Member

    Jun 7, 2007
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    Have you tired Hiren's Boot CD 10.2, It has many recovery tools etc on the disc
     
  11. thedonofdeath

    thedonofdeath MDL Member

    Oct 6, 2009
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    I am just going to be honest all that gave me a headache just delete the whole hard drive and start over. put win 7 on there and use removewat 2.2. any data u lost couldn't be that important to go through all that hell just to get some files. but if you really really really need them use ultimate boot cd and a usb drive..... /aspirin
     
  12. PSYB0RG

    PSYB0RG MDL Junior Member

    Sep 11, 2009
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    #13 PSYB0RG, Mar 16, 2010
    Last edited: Mar 16, 2010
    (OP)
    Ev1l- Im not using 10.2 quite, im using 10.1, and thats how im gathering some of my files back. But speaking of that, in one of the programs, its seeing my windows 7 as listed twice, and then vista, and my empty partition. I guess that they are overlapping each other, if thats possible (the 2 win 7)

    donofdeath- Tell me about it, it gave me a headache just thinking about all of this that i will have to go thru just to find some sort of solution. But these are highly needed files, alot of COURT stuff.

    (I spend quite a bit of time at COURTS [corporate administrative buildings] because quite a few guys in costumes with guns [officers] are always alleging that im some [corporate] PERSON(S) who is subject to the [corporate] legislative interesting art of words [corporate policy/codes that i havent even read, lol] that i allegedly violated, resulting in some assumed obligation to for me to APPEAR (only which ghosts can do) to PLEAD and receive some corporate benefit which is only entitled to members who are part of that political subdivision [CITIZENS]) Hope you guys understand that, lol.
     
  13. thedonofdeath

    thedonofdeath MDL Member

    Oct 6, 2009
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    well, court stuff is extremely important. all i can say is good luck. i don't really know how to help here except ultimate boot cd and a usb. otherwise u should listen to the smart people.
     
  14. PSYB0RG

    PSYB0RG MDL Junior Member

    Sep 11, 2009
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    don- we're all smart, just in different areas. (only dumb people believe there are dumb people) lol.

    (that should be a famous quote)
     
  15. thedonofdeath

    thedonofdeath MDL Member

    Oct 6, 2009
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    yes lol that is a very good quote just saying some people have better knowledge of this area. i would just copy and pastw files to a usb
     
  16. PSYB0RG

    PSYB0RG MDL Junior Member

    Sep 11, 2009
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    #18 PSYB0RG, Mar 17, 2010
    Last edited: Mar 17, 2010
    (OP)
    frisbee- thanks for the tip buddy, i will jump on it right away. But on a side note, I personally think EVERYTHING should be free tho, and it has been proven that it could work. I havent saw not 1 mod here charge for their services, and with all the information here, it can transform a total noob such as myself into a beginner guru, so imagine how it would be if every aspect of life was similar to this and other great forums, everybody helping everybody out of human decency. Therefore, creating a highly productive society and well informed one. Off the side note, i will try to see if i can find a free copy of the ZAR, lol

    If I need help with something else during these new methods, mind helping me out? And as far as Win 7 DVD, it ususally doesnt even allow me to boot that at all, so even if i wanted to do a fresh install, thats kinda of impossible for now, until i delete those partitions and start over. Weird huh?

    Oh, I dnt think the rescuva will be much help, but i will try it anyway. I say this because the partition with the data that needs be recovered isnt NTFS, FAT32 etc., its RAW!
     
  17. urie

    urie Moderator
    Staff Member

    May 21, 2007
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  18. frisbee66

    frisbee66 MDL Addicted

    Jul 30, 2009
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    If you cant boot to DVD for whatever reason, you will just have to connect the bad HDD in another PC with SATA drive and let that PC set the boot order in bios to make sure your SATA HDD is second
    Not being able to boot to a DVD means you cant boot to any iSO sw based solution on your PC
    You cant recover files live from a bad HDD anyway, you must install the sw and do it from a booting good drive.
    You cant fix a transmission while you are driving on the highway