can't boot windows after motherboard switch

[panchoman]

So, i got back home to find my motherboard and/or cpu to be dead (fans running, no video). so i went to the basement and pulled out my old rig :
biostar tforce 550 (nforce 550 chipset) and an athlonx2 4600 windsor i believe.

the rig that died was a gigabyte g33 (stripped variant of p35 chipset) mobo and a c2d e8200 maybe.

so windows 7 as normal wouldn't boot, due to driver conflicts probably.. so i tried to boot it in safe mode w/ networking.. still no go. it stalls after loading the classpnp.sys driver and then reboot. startup repair just does its "attempting repairs for 5 hours without letting you cancel" routine afterwards, because of the failure..

how can i get this to work? i'm already dealing with a hard drive failure on my laptop... please help me save my desktop!

 

[Nitro-Max]

You sir sound like you arent having much luck!

I wish i could help further but the best bet is normally a fresh install. Or a windows repair it should keep your files but you'd have to reload drivers,

 

[panchoman]

You sir sound like you arent having much luck!

I wish i could help further but the best bet is normally a fresh install. Or a windows repair it should keep your files but you'd have to reload drivers,

gah.. fresh install is going to be nearly impossible just because of how much stuff is on here that's important... and you're suggesting that an alternative is a repair install right? could do that, but it'd be a real pain... is there any way to remove old drivers? no way to do from linux right? i'm just suprised that windows wont work even with safe mode...

going to do a system restore, see if that helps at all..

 

[slyfox2151]

if its vista or windows 7, just reinstall it over the top of the old install, any files on that HDD/Partition will be moved into a folder called Windows.OLD.


boot the disk/usb, select advanced or custom install and select the current windows partition and hit install. it will warn you that any files will be moved to the folder "windows.old", click yes and proceed with the install as normal.



nothing will be deleted, well maybe the pagefile and hiber.sys file... but nothing importaint.




Pro Tip

set your windows partition to around 50GB, install windows, driver and all the programs you will ever use, then create an image that that and save it somewhere. next time you need to reinstall windows just copy the image back and you have a fresh install

 

[panchoman]

is there anyway that i can manually delete drivers (like literally deleting the files) so that they aren't functional and windows resorts to its own?

also, the reverse of that, is there anyway i get windows to use default drivers besides safe mode..

i believe that i might be able to edit the windows registry through linux.. if theres someway that hacking up the registry might disable the drivers?

 

[panchoman]

if its vista or windows 7, just reinstall it over the top of the old install, any files on that HDD/Partition will be moved into a folder called Windows.OLD.


boot the disk/usb, select advanced or custom install and select the current windows partition and hit install. it will warn you that any files will be moved to the folder "windows.old", click yes and proceed with the install as normal.

Pro Tip

set your windows partition to around 50GB, install windows, driver and all the programs you will ever use, then create an image that that and save it somewhere. next time you need to reinstall windows just copy the image back and you have a fresh install

nothing will be deleted, well maybe the pagefile and hiber.sys file... but nothing importaint.

i'd still have to deal with a clean registry and reinstalling right?

as for installing on top.. wouldn't a repair install be better if i go down that route? might see if i can just try and back up and everything start fresh =/

i like the pro tip btw! smart idea.

 

[Nitro-Max]

Im not really clued up with linux never used it,

If you cant get into windows through safe mode i dont think there is another way unless you can remove the hardrive and plug it in else where as a storage drive and either save all the files you need or delete the driver files. then plug it back in and try.

goodluck.

 

[slyfox2151]

iv only ever had around a 60% sucess rate with repairs and as such dont use that feature anymore.

yes you would need to install drivers and such... however nearly 100% of the old programs would still work and all user files would still be there.... all you would need to do is locate them in windows.old and copy/paste them to the new install and create some shortcuts.



you could even copy/paste your favourites back into firefox/IE/Chrome.




any programs that dont work usualy tell you why and its normaly due to a missing .DLL file... easy fix. goto google, type in the name of the file XXX.dll and download it, then place it in the system32 folder and try to run the program again, chances are it will either work or tell you its missing a 2nd .dll


Pro link
if you do reinstall windows i highly reccomend you goto http://ninite.com/ and select all the programs you usualy install, this will do the install automaticaly for you. very simple and quick.
p.s its safe, legit and free for personal use.





as for the registery... it plays very little part in most programs.... usualy only use'd for patches (to tell the installer where the application is located) and or cd keys. iv never seen a program fail to do its job due to lost regisery settings.

 

[panchoman]

iv only ever had around a 60% sucess rate with repairs and as such dont use that feature anymore.

yes you would need to install drivers and such... however nearly 100% of the old programs would still work and all user files would still be there.... all you would need to do is locate them in windows.old and copy/paste them to the new install and create some shortcuts.



you could even copy/paste your favourites back into firefox/IE/Chrome.

any programs that dont work usualy tell you why and its normaly due to a missing .DLL file... easy fix. goto google, type in the name of the file XXX.dll and download it, then place it in the system32 folder and try to run the program again, chances are it will either work or tell you its missing a 2nd .dll


Pro link
if you do reinstall windows i highly reccomend you goto http://ninite.com/ and select all the programs you usualy install, this will do the install automaticaly for you. very simple and quick.
p.s its safe, legit and free for personal use.

looks like i might just back up using linux live and then completely reformat and rebuild from the ground up...

love that link! it's like google pack on steroids! thanks!

 

[slyfox2151]

looks like i might just back up using linux live and then completely reformat and rebuild from the ground up...

love that link! it's like google pack on steroids! thanks!

no worrys... i had never herd/seen google pack before either.. glad i found ninite tho...... SOOO MANY HOURS SAVED due to this one website lol.

 

[overclocking101]

the problem is you are going from an intel to an amd chipset. if you were going intel to intel or amd to amd you would be fine If you dont wanna loose stuff I'd say get another hdd and fresh install then copy+paste or get another board of the same manufacturer chipset

 

[panchoman]

no worrys... i had never herd/seen google pack before either.. glad i found ninite tho...... SOOO MANY HOURS SAVED due to this one website lol.

google has loads of things that are hardly known. pack.google.com is like a really scaled down version of ninite. but ninite is just like WOW!

 

[robn]

is there anyway that i can manually delete drivers (like literally deleting the files) so that they aren't functional and windows resorts to its own?

also, the reverse of that, is there anyway i get windows to use default drivers besides safe mode..

i believe that i might be able to edit the windows registry through linux.. if theres someway that hacking up the registry might disable the drivers?

You can edit registry "remote" style, i.e. load up another system's hive. Registry is stored in files in ...\windows\system32\config. There are Linux rescue discs that have apps to do it, or you could transplant the HDD as a data drive in another Windows machine. Once you have the registry opened, drivers are listed under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet...\Enum.

You will likely see a couple of control sets existing from when Windows has figured your setup has changed, but you might switch back (I think). Delete devices under "enum" as you see fit. CurrentControlSet is a "live" copy of one of the other sets, that Windows creates on boot, so I think it should be ignored.

Next boot will cause plug and play process to run and fix stuff.

Obviously, reg editing = backup first / know what the consequences are / etc.

There may also be startup software related to devices (think realtek audio control panel) that should be removed from HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run

I must say, I've heard about fixing this way years ago, but never fancied trying it!