Error loading operating system, BSOD, and no reaction

waverly911

I came across a previously seen error loading operating system recently. After hunting for the recovery cd, I used the fixmbr and fixboot commands and was able to get win xp home to load. Last time I had this issue, these commands worked and I was up and running again.

As my desktop was loading Windows I was congratulating myself on the quick fix since I knew this meant the problem was resolved. Well the Blue Sceen of Death popped up with *** Stop: 0x0000008e (0xc0000005, 0xf2e3721d, 0xb9f837ec 0x00000000). I went through this scenario at least 50 times. I was somehow able to boot in safe mode (wasn't able to repeat this feat since ).

In SAFE mode I went to run, msconfig, removed all checkmarks in the startup tab, and rebooted without recovery cd. With my desktop icons in the background and windows loading a box popped up saying I had tinkered with the startup and there was a blank box I could check so I wouldn't need to see this again when the BSOD appeared again.

I powered down and did yet another fixboot, fixmbr and rebooted. I saw all my desktop icons but there was no reaction when I moved my mouse over them and clicked them, nor when I did a right click on an empty space on the desktop, and my mouse went from pointer to hourglass if I moved it to the bottom over the START button or the time button on the other side. Within 60 seconds, the BSOD (Blue Screen of Death) was back.

I wasn't sure what to do and was hoping someone could help.

I have most of the files backed up. I am concerned about programs I don't have a cd for since I downloaded them from the internet and they were for a one computer use.

Thank you for taking the time to look at my issue.

BlackHawk

From what I can gather while googling, you need to run Memtest.

waverly911

I ran and am currently running memtest and after 8 passes there are no errors. It has been running for over 9 hours. Not sure if this info helps but erads jmemtest 86 v2.11 Pentium 4 (0.13) 2667 mhz L1 Cache 8k 19324 mb/s L2 Cache 512k 16878 mb/s L3 cache none memory 20447M 1050 mb/s

What else can I try? Thank you

waverly911

I also tried Troll 's suggestion with the DISABLE pe 386 command. Did this in recovery console, typed 1 enter, enter for password, DISABLE pe386 and I recieved the following feedback "The registry entry for the pe386 service cannot be located. Check that the name of the service is specified correctly. "

Please note that I was unable to uninstall restore which is what Symantec says to do since when I get to the startup screen I have 60 seconds before the BSOD (Blue Screen of Death appears).

You can see the issue I have at youtube user fanofthetigerband In that video I get no reaction when I click any desktop icon and the pointer goes to an hourglass. Now I can click anything with no reaction and the BSOD appears within 60 seconds.

kryyst

Go into your system bios and make sure that all your settings are set to the defaults, then try botting up into safemode.

siruspernot

Why hasn't anyone suggested he replace his hard drive yet? It sounds like you have a bad set of sectors near the boot area. If this is the case scandisk won't fix that and sometimes won't even detect it. You can try a scandisk /p i think it is from recovery console and see if it clears it up. If not, put in a new hdd.

waverly911

Thanks. I'll try scandisk /p in recovery. Can I put this hard drive on another xp home edition use it as a slave and access all my programs and data? One of my conerns is I have software that I downloded from the net, so I don't have the cds and don't want to pay again to put it on another computer.

Thrax

Yes, you should be able to connect it as a slave to recover your files. Drives damaged in the way you're describing are typically unable to boot (physical damage in boot areas), but can be accessed for file backup.

siruspernot

You're going to have trouble backing up license information for programs from a non working system manually. If the files you are talking about are Installation files that you either have the serial number for or that do not require a serial number then you are OK. However if you just want to drag and drop your Program Files directory and hope for the best it won't work because of the registry. Betting that your registry is corrupted now also I wouldn't try backing it up. Your best bet is simply copying over your personal data files like pictures, documents, media, etc and doing full resinstallations of all your programs on a new drive.

I you in fact own the software you want to keep then downloading the installation program from the manufacturer website and entering in your serials or licenses will work fine, saving you from trying to copy them incorrectly.

waverly911

I can't do a scandisk in recovery. I typed help and don't see it listed under the commands. Have attrib, batch, bootcfg, cd, chdir, chkdsk, cls, copy, del, delete, dir, disable, diskpart, enable, exit, expand, fixboot, fixmbr, format, help, listsve, logon, map, md, mkdir, more, net, rd, ren, rename, rmdir, systemroot, type. I type the command and it rads the command is not recognized. Type hELP for a list of supproted commands.

I have most of my files documents, records, pics, videos, etc. backed up on a external hard drive. So you're saying my PROGRAMS will work in the slave mode? I also

siruspernot

use chkdsk in recovery console, sorry. save scandisk for when you are in safe mode with command prompt.

About your programs, every program is different and the more complicated it is, the bigger the chance it wont work out of slave mode. You wouldn't want to use them from slave mode on a working system anyway, else you'd start to see BSOD again when you hit bad spots while loading data. Get what you can off of it, then replace it. Don't use it after that.

siruspernot

Another thing I just thought of after reading all of this, if chkdsk/scandisk comes back clean, make sure you arent overheating. You could have some cobweb cornbread baking in the fins of your heatsink. Some of the symptoms you describe are common of overheating also. computers are lovely arent they? lol

waverly911

I did the 8 simple steps to repair win xp. Right before bootupI have a page that reads WINDOWS XP HOME EDITION (one I did using 8 steps) and Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition which was there before. The first one gives me the no reaction when I click anything and the second one gives the BSOD. Will it matter if I do the 8 steps and name it Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition or is that just not worth it.

Are there any other fixes I can attemp since I don't want to let go of this box. I won't be able to use my card printers that require a legit parallel port and I don't have that with Vista.

Thrax

The 8 simple steps guide will not resolve the issue you are having. Please test the physical integrity of your hard drive with DFT or use Seagate's SEATOOLS for DOS if that does not work.

siruspernot

letting go of the box really isnt an issue, replacing just a hard drive is minor work if you familiarize yourself with the process. It's essentially checking the jumper setting to make sure its appropriate for your setup (default is usually fine). You swap in the new one in the same spot as the old one. plug in the power molex and IDE ribbon (Assuming its not SATA) and you put your windows CD in and install fresh. I appologize if I tell you anything you may already know, I don't know your tech level.

What I'm getting at is assuming you have a bad hard drive (very common in systems 2+ years old) your option is recovering any data possible onto a working computer and installing a new hard drive with a fresh copy of windows. Before you go through all this trouble though, make sure all the plugs on your motherboard are secure and theres no dust in your heatsink and your fans are working.

waverly911

Thank you for your help. The memtest showed that there were no errors after 8 passes and 9 hours of testing. No errors on the hard drive with the tool on another post. Decided to try the walare scan and it seems this is the problem. Doing a full scan gets timed out with Nt Authority\system. Found over a dozen infected objected. Hoping that the quick scan will allow me to contain and remove the infected objects before I get any errors which happen about 30 minutes in.

siruspernot

If this turns out to be some horrible virus infection please bring back here the results and details. It'd be interesting to see and might save someone some future trouble.

waverly911

I was told to do a hijackthis.exe in safemode and submit the results for evaluation. Hoping I get help soon. Right now I am running malwarebytes again and I received the svchost.exe error after 35 minutes of being in safemode and if I click either option then I have 1 minute before it reboots out of safemode. I decided not to touch the svchost.exe and malware is running showing over a dozen issues hoping the computer doesn't reboot on its own since I couldn't stop it before. Absolutely I will bring back the results. I decided to run the vundofix and this time it found no errors after finding 8 earlier. I hit fixvundo after I saw the errors, but I was in the 1 minute countdown and wasn't sure if it was fixed or not.

siruspernot

Now remember this, if it's just a software issue like being full of malware you can always back up your personal files that you know arent infected and just reformat and reinstall. I understand you have programs you want to keep. A program that I was turned onto and now swear by is ComboFix. When I suspect viral activity this is the first program I run to try and restore the foundation enough for me to start cleaning everything else without everything failing around you. It's worth a shot if your current regimine isn't working. This program was last listed here on Icrontic in 2007 it seems, you can find it below:

http://download.bleepingcomputer.com/sUBs/ComboFix.exe

Thrax

Our spyware team uses ComboFix in its standard battery of malware-removal tools. Waverly911 has started a thread in that forum for help, and he should get fixed up in a jiffy.

waverly911

Problem resolved and thank you to everyone's input here and to this site.

From what I could tell, many errors seem to be in the registry from the log I read in malwarebyes' program (more below). In safe mode I ran Vundofix again and received an error message 35 minutes in about debugging the program. When I clicked it before when it came up, I had 60 seconds to save my work and then it shut down. This time I ignored it and Vundofix found no errors so I presumed that the prior run when I hit fix took even though I was inside of the 60 seconds before shut down.

After that I ran Malwarebytes' Anti-malware again (before it was timed out and found 19 errors but I didn't have a chance to fix any) and it ran for at least two hours before I left the room. When I came back it said it found over 150 issues and it had finished scanning! It fixed what it could and then I had to reboot. It was odd that it had vundo as one of the infected files since I ran this Malwarebyte program after the vundofix scan that reported no errors. I clicked the button to reboot, left the room, asked St. Jude for a little help, and when I came back and hit my user, everything was great.

I'm up an running again and hope that it isn't a temporary tease. I even rebooted and it still work! For the non computer person like me, I would like to point out that the memtest (to determine if it was faulty memory) required a special cd burning software for the ISO file so I could use it in safemode. There were a couple of files that I tried that had an ISO image file. I used IMGburn which was a free download.

It was also important to have the Reinstallation CD so that I could get rid of the error loading operating system. This simply required hitting f8 on bootup. Booting from the cd drive, letting it run in the blue screen, typing R when it finished, 1, enter for admin password, then fixmbr, y, and fixboot, y, exit.

When I had this BSOD error it was difficult for me to get into safe mode. From what I could find, you have to hit f8, but this would take me straight to boot from floppy, hard disk, or floppy. I did a weird combo of f11, f11 and control, f11 and alt, then f8 and it got me to safe mode. I know, it's weird, but just wanted to pass it along since I wasted a lot of time just trying to get into safe mode.

Hopefully if someone gets the same issue as I had, their downtime will be less because of the information found here.

Thanks again to everyone for the great information.

siruspernot

Thanks for the info. What turned out to be the cause of the problem? Preventing it in the future would be better than knowing the fix.

waverly911

Not sure about the cause. Wish I knew. One of the last things I recall doing was installing a windows update because of an article I read about a windows security flaw. I was surprised I had so many infected files since I had an antivirus program. The fix should help though so people can get up and running again with little down time instead of trying to figure out what to do.

Thrax

He had a spyware infection primarily based on the Vundo strain of malware, Sirus. It's very common, and the typical software culprit of the 0x0000008E blue screen (and 0x0000001C).

@Waverly:
The only way to protect yourself against spyware is to be careful online. Don't stray past page 3 or 4 of Google, don't click email links, don't click banners unless they're on sites you trust, never install toolbars of any kind, etc.

The problem with programatically preventing spyware is many-fold:
1) Spyware is way more common than viruses.
2) Spyware evolves way, way faster than viruses do.
3) Spyware does not infect a file, so it cannot be detected with a before/after comparison.
4) On the hard drive, spyware looks like any other program on the system.
5) One spyware installation typically invites more, whereas viruses usually do not.
6) Spyware infects parts of the system that can only be accessed when the system is running. Virus-filled hard drives can be disinfected on another machine without issue.

Put simply, there isn't a single program on earth that can prevent spyware. Even those that claim to prevent spyware do so for an incomprehensibly small group of extremely common spyware strains.

For viruses, did you know that the best anti-virus applications only catch 50% of all new viruses?

The best security is caution.

siruspernot

Nice to know. When I do house calls for my customers 99% of the time I am fighting spyware. The real problem is that spyware is funded by advertising agencies. Shady websites will put their advertising code in their page and when you load their page, you are presented with popups or other applets misleading the visitor. My clients can't tell the difference between a fake windows system alert and a real one. Such things as "you're computer is infected, let MS Antivirus 2008 scan your system and repair it" an uninformed user will believe this very real looking presentation and follow through with it, ultimately installing malware. I'm sure everyone has seen those little false MSN messenger things at websites that pretend to be real messenger alerts.

The problem can't really be helped by antivirus. Educating ourselves on what not to click on is the single best way to keep from getting infected.