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System Recovery CD Problems DiscussionSystem Recovery CD Problems DiscussionSubjects > Computers > Hardware > New Pc Missing Recovery Disks
Revamping Recovery. Ed Foster, The Gripe Line. InfoWorld?Create Magazine issue dated February 28, 2002. Hewlett-Packard has stopped shipping recovery CDs with its Windows XP PCs. HP claims that Windows XP is so big it would require at least a half dozen CDs for recovery. Instead, they put it all on the hard drive in a 4 gigabyte protected partition. Problem 1: the hard drive might die. Problem 2: The partition table on the hard drive might get corrupted, leaving the computer with no idea where each partition begins and ends. Problem 3: Even without problem 1 or 2, some people still found that the recovery partition was not accessible due to problems in Windows XP. Customers griped. HP eventually offered a set of WinXP?Create recovery CDs to customers for $10. Problem 4: HP would not send the recovery CDs to every customer that asked for them. You had to beg. - http://www.infoworld.com/articles/op/xml/02/02/18/020218opfoster.xml
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lordbaerVillage Member
Posts: 1(2/25/03 10:48 am)
Reply system recovery cd problems
I tried to upgrade my pcg-f340 running windows 98 with windows xp pro (full version, not upgrade). Unfortunately, the install program would always shut down right when it was about to load the software. (It prepares the drive for a while, then it restarts the machine, and then the machine doesn't fully finish loading and I get a blank screen, no hard drive activity, but the power stays on.) At this point, I try to boot the machine off the cd, and do a new install, choosing to reformat the disk to NTFS. It completes this correctly, but then when it comes time to install again, I get the same screen blackout. Soooo, I figured that my computer can't run xp, so I go to reinstall 98. I got a boot disk off bootdisk.com, and reformatted the HD back to a dos partition, copied some system files over and got to installing win98. I realized that the cd's i got with the computer (i bought it used, and i got a burned cd with win98, and another with the sony drivers that are on their website) weren't the official recovery disks. Windows 98 is loaded again, but the computer only boots from floppy, and 98 shuts down and has many errors with devices, like IR port, firewire port, monitor resolution can't be changed, etc.
Basically, I was wondering if I can get the official recovery disks from someone (or if they'd even work at this point), or if someone knows how I can get XP to work. I'd just like the computer to work.
Edited by: lordbaer at: 3/3/03 7:42:20 pm
Timiboy
Posts: 300 (2/25/03 11:57 am) Reply ezSupporter
Some ideas ;)
lordbaer Village Member Posts: 2 (2/25/03 8:19 pm) Reply Re: Some ideas ;)
hylton Owner Emeritus Posts: 2215 (2/25/03 8:55 pm) Reply Re: Some ideas ;)
If you read our member agreement, we do not allow the use of our forum for the discussion obtaining copies of, sale of, and/or exhange of recovery disks between members...please take a moment and read the agreement.
Thanks, Chris Hylton
EzDoezIt?CreateAdministrator Posts: 845 (2/25/03 8:55 pm) Reply ezSupporter
Re: Some ideas ;)
Cheers Eddie
Please review the FAQ and Think Tank (all pages) before posting.
New users, please read this topic.
lordbaer Village Member Posts: 3 (2/25/03 9:01 pm) Reply Re: upgrade problems, need some recovery disks
hylton Owner Emeritus Posts: 2216 (2/25/03 10:49 pm) Reply Re: upgrade problems, need some recovery disks
If you post more specifics on what is working, you might find some help in getting XP working...you'll be much happier (IMHO) w/ XP...so give that a shot before you spend the time and effort to go back to 98...
Chris
sibia Village Member Posts: 6 (2/26/03 12:56 am) Reply Re: upgrade problems, need some recovery disks
I recd your private msg. I regret to inform u that I won't be of much to help u since I'm located outside US, hence it won't be feasible to transport the required CDs to u.
Thanx and Regards, Sibia
lordbaer Village Member Posts: 4 (3/3/03 7:40 pm) Reply tried xp yet again, got recovery cd's
I tried to do a clean install of XP pro, which meant I formatted the hd again, and then ran the xp install off the cd. The install program shut my computer down exactly how it did when I tried to upgrade. The computer would restart and when it gets into the mode to actually install the files, the computer's screen would go blank, and I'd have to shut down the power with the switch. The computer is technically on, but nothing on screen and no hd activity. I also read that you have to activate xp, and i was planning on using it on a computer I build in the near future, so I am giving up on the idea of running it on my laptop to test it out.
So I am happy to say I got the recovery cds, in the hopes of getting it all back to normal. So I did another fdisk to get rid of the NTFS partition, and created a regular fat32 partition. I did a format /s option, and then I put the recovery cd in to see if that would work. I get the following message:
Error: This recovery CD is NOT for your computer.
I checked the c: drive, and the only thing on it is COMMAND.COM
Did I miss a step somewhere, or is there something else I need to do? I thought I saw a post that said the computer searches for a sony file somewhere, but I couldn't find that post today. Does anyone know what I need to do?
Edited by: lordbaer at: 3/3/03 7:44:18 pm
hylton Owner Emeritus Posts: 2247 (3/3/03 9:03 pm) Reply Re: tried xp yet again, got recovery cd's
The recovery CD shouldn't have to look for anything...if you boot up (using the drive on your computer) it should automatically reconize the recovery CD, install the necessary files to a 'virtual drive' and begin the unpack of the image on the recovery CD...
If that's not working, only three things I can think of...1) you don't have the right recovery CDs for the computer you have...or...2) you have done something to the BIOS that could somehow be preventing the recovery from kicking off...3) formatting to FAT32 might have something to do with it, if the original system was NTFS...not sure...
Are either of those three things a possiblity based on what you know at this point ?
Chris
lordbaer Village Member Posts: 5 (3/3/03 9:14 pm) Reply Re: tried xp yet again, got recovery cd's
The recovery cds say PCG-f340 version G24.0, and my computer is a pcg-f340.
I haven't done anything to the bios (i don't even know how to check it).
The original system was win98, does that run on an NTFS file system? I thought it was just running a FAT32 system, and that's what it says now. I thought it was only changed because xp had that type of file system.
hylton Owner Emeritus Posts: 2251 (3/3/03 9:22 pm) Reply Re: tried xp yet again, got recovery cd's
Yea, you are right...sorry...didn't read your post further up...that it was a F340 model...but yes, if it was Win98, that's what the recovery CD is gonig to attempt to put back, and it's going to make the drive FAT32, as you said...plus, I don't even think it matters what the C drive is formatted to initially, the recovery CDs (pretty sure) reformat the drive to whatever it needs...
I still can't think of a reason that those CDs would produce that message...they should be looking at the BIOS and/or something to determine the model, but if those match (which they do) it should kick off just fine...
I'm at a loss after reading through this thread...only thing I can think is to call Sony and see if they have any ideas as to why the recovery CD isn't recognized by the system it's suppose to be used on...
Lastly, you might poke through the site here and look for recovery cd issues..maybe there is something there somewhere that's been addressed before...
Sorry, Chris
lordbaer Village Member Posts: 6 (3/3/03 11:35 pm) Reply Re: tried xp yet again, got recovery cd's
i appreciate your trying to help. thanks anyway
lordbaer Village Member Posts: 7 (3/4/03 9:30 am) Reply news from sony
"If the error message does appear, the BIOS is either missing a required character string or has become corrupted." Then it says if this is the case, my computer needs service. I saw the prices for "tier 1 service", it's $276.73!!!!!! Does anyone know where I can get an original bios, or if the update bios for windows2000 would work without destroying my computer any further? (Will windows 98 work ok with a windows2000 bios?)
hylton Owner Emeritus Posts: 2256 (3/4/03 12:24 pm) Reply Re: news from sony
Second, the Win2K bios will still allow Win98 to run, it just updates some of the 'under the hood' stuff so that Win2K can use the function keys and such...BUT, I had a problem after updating my N505VE vaio to Win2k (and updated the BIOS) in that now, the recovery CDs work, but they lock up at 58%...I've been told by some more competent 505 owners that I just need the Sony CDrom (I was trying to recover from the D drive w/ a bootable floppy) which I don't have...but, just a warning that I'm not totally sure it's not the bios upgrade that's causing this problem...
If you are stuck at this point anyway, couldn't hurt to flash the Win2k bios and then try everything from there...because, if you send it back to Sony for service, they can always flash the bios back for you in the process...
I'm more curious how your BIOS got corrupted...did you buy this used from someone...or have you owned it since it's new...if it's always been in your possession and you haven't messed w/ the BIOS through a flash of a non-Sony version at some point...I'd argue about that charge from Sony til the cows come home...because the problem would have been there from the start...short of doing a flash, there really isn't a way to screw the bios up that I know of ! ! !
Just some thoughts...
Chris
Edited by: hylton at: 3/4/03 12:24:45 pm
lordbaer Village Member Posts: 8 (3/4/03 7:19 pm) Reply Re: news from sony
It confused me when they told me the bios could be corrupt or is missing information. I was wondering, "does xp change the bios?", it doesn't seem right to me that a program could change or corrupt a bios.
I got a response again from sony to check their site for the upgrade bios, so I sent them another email to see if the bios upgrade freezes my system, if they are going to fix it without me paying for it. I will wait till I hear from them to do this to fix it before I have to have someone flash the original bios onto it.
hylton Owner Emeritus Posts: 2266 (3/4/03 9:55 pm) Reply Re: news from sony
If you can find someone else w/ a F340, compare the bios versions in setup and see if you see a difference...or...check the Sony support site for your model and see if there is a BIOS update, if so, you could to that, but I wouldn't know whether that would correct the model info or not...
Chris
lordbaer Village Member Posts: 9 (3/5/03 10:51 am) Reply Re: news from sony
SubspaceEddy?Create Village Member Posts: 1 (3/11/03 8:46 am) Reply Re: system recovery cd problems
Basically, XP was waiting for user input - a dialog box somewhere, but it wasn't displayed on screen - if you plug in a monitor during install, you can see it. It's got something to do with XP thinking that you are displaying on two monitors even though you are not, and setting the resolution on the lcd to something ridiculous.
I found a way to fix it on another board somewhere... it was a change to the bios - a setting for 'lcd', 'crt' or 'both'. I can't remember which I changed it to, i do remember it didn't seem to make much sense though, but it did work.
You can't just carry on the install with the monitor plugged in either, since next boot without a monitor will result in the blank screen again.
See also New Pc Missing Recovery Disks
Wassap. Hey guys. Just thought you should know I figured out in two seconds how to hack the protection off the damn recovery disks. I have a pcg-f590 and needed to reinstall 2k Pro, so they sent me the pcg-f590(k) disk, and guess what
This cd is NOT for your computer
etc.
So what do I do? First of all, I download a copy of NTRaWrite?Create off sourceforge. I find the .BIN file on the CD. I write the BIN file to a floppy disk with NTRaWrite?Create. That's the boot image. Then, the batch file can be edited a:\spt\recover.bat. I patched the line
if errorlevel 1 goto OTHER
to read REM if errorlevel 1 goto OTHER REM edit out copy protection.
Now I saved recover.bat, used NtRaWrite?Create --reverse, and saved the Bin file to my harddrive.
Openned up Nero Burning Rom to a bootable CD, copied all the files from the original CD, replaced the original BIN file with my hacked BIN, and set the bootable options to use the BIN file for boot.
Tah-dah. No more copy protection for you. Having sony do it in a batch file is probably the most rediculous idea I've ever heard of.
-l0
P.S. Reversing the application installer is a little more complicated, I've done it but it took me about 10-15 minutes to crack it and burn everything--you're better off just using the individual installers, they're in the folders on the CD.
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