Stuck in Automatic repair loop. refresh/restore wont work

oldjamaica

New Member
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5
Hi.
I accidentally removed a usb cable from a powered usb hub , and a volume slider of some other program appeared superimposed and floating above my music making program , so I restarted the pc.
From then on , it wouldnt start , and kept saying preparing automatic repair, then reached 40% and wouldnt go any further.

I unplugged my 2 external drives because they werent showing in the bios , and plugged them into my laptop to check they were ok , and im relieved to say they are.

Since i removed the drives , my desktop ( asus ) will eventually arrive at the blue recovery screen , but all these things that are supposed to help fix it , arent working.

When I try to refresh , it says the drive where windows is installed is locked
Ive tried to do a system restore from 3 different restore points and none of them have worked ( one actually cited a mozilla profile as being the cause )
Re-image wont work because it cant find the image file , which is on one of my external drives which are now unplugged.
Automatic repair diagnoses , but then says it cant repair.
It also will not boot into safe mode.

I can use command prompt, and was hoping I could rename the system hive name , but the command prompt says
X=\windows\system32.
Ive tried cd%windir%\system32\config , but it says " the drive , the path, or the filname is not valid"
I have successfuly ran regedit from the command prompt , but to be honest , im out of my depth and dont know what im doing , but at least something is working.

I had no reasons to expect anything untoward before yesterday. The automatic repair thing happened before , about 4 months ago , but i was always able to get out of it by switching it off at the wall. Now that doesnt work and its in an endless loop .

Could someone help me to get this thing started again ?

Ps. I have hirens bootcd but there are a lot of things on it that i dont know how to use. I was able to get mini xp working via hirens but couldnt access system restore.
 
Last edited:

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8
Would you be able to reinstall Windows?
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8.1 Update 1 Pro 64bit
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Pavillion H8-1202
    CPU
    I7-2600 @ 3.4 GHz
    Motherboard
    PEGATRON
    Memory
    8 GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    NIVDIA GeForce GT 520
    Sound Card
    Realtek ALC656GR CODEC
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Samsung SyncMaster S22B350
    Screen Resolution
    1920X1080 32 bit color
    Hard Drives
    Samsung 850 EVO SSD 500GB
    Keyboard
    Razer Blackwidow Ultimate 2013
    Mouse
    Logitech M510
Thanks nuccii , but I unfortunately didnt get any discs with the computer and windows 8 was pre-installed. I hate how they do that now , cos id prefer to refresh windows that way. As it is now , I cant get at it.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8
I unplugged my 2 external drives because they werent showing in the bios , and plugged them into my laptop to check they were ok , and im relieved to say they are.
I suggest to disconnect the power cord, press and hold the power button to discharge the caps on the MB, reset BIOS to default then plug in 1 of your external HD's, power on your PC to see if the PC regconize it. If it does then I guess you can restore your back up, if not then continue to next step.
I can use command prompt, and was hoping I could rename the system hive name , but the command prompt says
X=\windows\system32.
Ive tried cd%windir%\system32\config , but it says " the drive , the path, or the filname is not valid"
I have successfuly ran regedit from the command prompt , but to be honest , im out of my depth and dont know what im doing , but at least something is working.
When you boot from the recovery disk or from Windows DVD installation disk, you are booting into Windows PE and it resides in RAM with the drive letter X:. This is not your real Windows drive C:, to find out what drive letter it is assigned to your Windows drive C: , you need to use diskpart->list disk. Most of the times it is still drive C: but sometimes it is assigned to another drive letter.

Every 10 days or so, Windows makes a backup of your system registry and put in:
C:\Windows\System32\config\RegBack
and your current system registry is in:
C:\Windows\System32\config

If you wish, you can copy the backup registry from Regback folder to config folder:
SAM, DEFAULT, SECURITY, SOFTWARE
and SYSTEM

Reboot the PC
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    8.1x64PWMC Ubuntu14.04x64 MintMate17x64
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Home Brewed
    CPU
    I7 4970K OC'ed @4.7 GHz
    Motherboard
    MSI-Z97
    Memory
    16 GB G-Skill Trident X @2400MHZ
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA GeForce GTS 450
    Sound Card
    X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Dual HP-W2408
    Screen Resolution
    1920X1200
    Hard Drives
    256 GB M2 sm951, (2) 500GB 850EVO, 5TB, 2 TB Seagate
    PSU
    Antec 850W
    Case
    Antec 1200
    Cooling
    Danger Den H20
    Keyboard
    Logitech
    Mouse
    Logitech Performance Mouse MX
    Internet Speed
    35/12mbps
    Browser
    Firefox
Thanks topgun.
can I copy the regback file from within regedit ?
do I have to copy it to all those other folders too ?
what are the best and worst case scenarios if I do this ?
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8
can I copy the regback file from within regedit ?
No, just cd to Regback and type: copy SAM .. ====> .. is the parent directory of regback which is config.
do I have to copy it to all those other folders too ?
No
what are the best and worst case scenarios if I do this ?
The best is you might be able to boot Windows back to working again.
The worst is you would lose any modifications that were made in the registry since last backup. For example, if you recently installed an application, this application might break but you can always re-install it. In addition, any settings to the system, you'd have to re-set them.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    8.1x64PWMC Ubuntu14.04x64 MintMate17x64
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Home Brewed
    CPU
    I7 4970K OC'ed @4.7 GHz
    Motherboard
    MSI-Z97
    Memory
    16 GB G-Skill Trident X @2400MHZ
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA GeForce GTS 450
    Sound Card
    X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional Series
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Dual HP-W2408
    Screen Resolution
    1920X1200
    Hard Drives
    256 GB M2 sm951, (2) 500GB 850EVO, 5TB, 2 TB Seagate
    PSU
    Antec 850W
    Case
    Antec 1200
    Cooling
    Danger Den H20
    Keyboard
    Logitech
    Mouse
    Logitech Performance Mouse MX
    Internet Speed
    35/12mbps
    Browser
    Firefox
Could you write thecommand line exactly as I should type it ?
im not sure about DOS and have no knowledge of it at all
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    windows 8
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