Hi everyone, Hoping you all can help me- I made a pretty dumb set of mistakes with Vista Ultimate 64. I had been running it since January, I think using SoftMod. But it got disabled when Vista ran this latest update- clicked on the pop-up when I was in the middle of some work and told it to fix the problem without looking at what problem it was fixing. Upon my next boot, I got locked out of Vista, saying that my version is not valid. I can use a web browser (to purchase a real version of Vista), but that's it. I don't want to do a fresh install, but at the same time, I can't access Vista to run any potential workarounds. Am I just screwed, or is there a workaround that doesn't require me to be in Vista to install? I haven't backed up my data in a while and don't want to risk losing anything... I was thinking my first move should be to install Windows 7 (or xp) on a new HD to at least retrieve all my data. Then if I have to do a clean install, I can do so worry-free. Thanks for your help, and sorry for being a novice with this stuff. I feel astounding pangs of stupidity every time I think of the moment I clicked through- I'm pretty sure that's what did it, though I've yet to read reports of anyone else f'ing up their install this way. Oh, my specs: Asus P5b-E Intel e6400 6 GB RAM 2x250 GB in raid0 Radeon x1950 pro 1 200 GB data drive 1 300 GB data drive And I have a shiny new Samsung Spinpoint 1 TB I'm waiting to install.
Have you tried running in safe mode to see if you can get access to desktop if you can't there are various ways if you can get hold of an acronis diskdirector boot cd you could make another partiton on you drive it will do it without deleting any data then you could boot with a windows PE cd and copy any needed files over to second partition then reinstall windows.
Thanks for your reply. The drive has three partitions- one with an old (nonworking) XP install, one with Vista and another for data. I can overwrite the old XP install. What is a Windows PE cd? Basically, my best option is to rescue my data and reinstall vista. OK. Can't even boot Vista to safe mode. Can only run a browser (Ffox) and can't access any other functionality. I get a black screen w/a message in the lower right that says "Build 6000 This copy of Windows is not genuine".... EDIT: Didn't realize this, but I think it will allow me to run .exe files I download in FFox. So if there is a potential workaround for this problem, I should be able to point to a workaround and run it from the FFox download window. EDIT 2: Is there a way to access my desktop from my laptop (or from within my web browser on the desktop) to move my files to the data partition? Again, I can run an exe from the browser window if needed.
Thanks, but I still can't copy files from w/in FF. Windows kicks me out after a few minutes using FF, which is pretty annoying.
why don't you install vista or xp on a separate drive and set it as your boot primary drive and the other drive (the one with data on it) as a slave. this will give you access to your data
If you haven't disabled system restore you should be able to boot from CD and select a restore point from before the update was applied. You then need to back date your PC's clock as well. I've had to do this myself a couple times.
I tried the system restore option, but didn't backdate the PC clock first. I do this in the bios? Vista should then book normally, allowing me to fix the problem.
Thanks... I'll try PE builder when I'm off work this weekend. It looks like i can build the CD from my laptop and then use it on my desktop. Man Msoft making me feel really dumb for running into this problem.
Backdating system clock... How do I do this? Is it done in the bios or in Vista itself? Thanks. NVM, changed the bios system date to 2/21 and restored to same date- it is now working! I have two days left to activate- should I try a Bios mod now? How hard/risky is this for a newbish person? Using Asus p5b-e.