[Lunatique]

Sorry for posting this here too, but some of you don't read Random Musings, and this is an emergency.

My win2000 all of a sudden won't boot up. It gets stuck right before the splash screen. It's happened once before, and I had to reinstall windows. I do NOT want to do that this time since I will lose the 3D work I've been doing for the last few months.

I'm using my laptop to write this, and I'll wait for some good solutions from you techie gurus before I use my last resort--reinstalling.

Help!

[Ian Jones]

I don't know anything about win2000, but you could try pressing F8 just before the splash screen like 95-98 let you. As this should let you choose whether you want to boot up normal mode, safe mode, or dos. It's a start.

Other than that, try checking that all your connection points inside the case are touching. Eg... especially RAM. It happened to me once, the comp kept on freezing. It was a loose connection in the RAM slot.

Good luck.

[Lunatique]

I tried all the common methods already(F8, boot from CD ROM...etc).

I'll check the connections now.

[Lunatique]

Nope, all connections are fine, other than one of the fans was unplugged after installing a new HD a couple months ago(ran out of plugs).

BTW, if I reinstall win2000 without reformating first, would it erase the content of My Documents? All of my Maya project stuff are in there, and it would suck to lose months of work(I'll rememer to back up my 3D stuff from now on. Grrr...).

[Ian Jones]

I can't say for sure, but win98 doesnt seem to daage anything when you re-install. So I'm gonna make the braod assumption that its ok to re-install. Except, when you mention my documents folder... it makes me a bit tentative. Wait for someone who knows a bit more.

[pixelsoldier]

I'm 90% confident that if you reinstall 2k without formatting that your documents will remain untouched. Just don't change the filesystem (obviously) from FAT to NTFS or vice-versa.

[dontfallin]

this happened to my friend he lost everything

[ValarianROOT]

It could be a few different things. What does it do when you try to boot into win2k?
Flashing cursor? Have your tried reinstalling the boot sector? What was the last thing that happened before it stopped booting?

JN

[Basement bound]

Sorry, I can't help.
But, thats what you get for buying a PC.
*Jab-jab*

[randomizer]

Why don't you just plug the HD to a different computer and then copy the files to another HD? It seems to me, that this would be the easiest solution...

[Lunatique]

Because I don't have another puter here other than 2 laptops, and it's a pain in the ass to network them to the main puter when my OS is dead.

Grrr.
Ok, I finally found someone who had a boot disk(I don't have one)to come over and then copied all the stuff I needed from C to another partition. My Maya files are saved. I even got to save my Dungeon Siege save files. Woo!

Now, I have to go and reinstall ALL OF MY FRIGGIN' PROGRAMS.

I still don't know what caused the problem. But I made sure to change My Document's root folder to a seperate partition, and I'll be using an anti-virus program religiously from now on.

BTW, which anti-virus is the shitznazz? Norton? McAfee?

Also, thanks for all the helpful advice. I learned a few things.

[ June 22, 2002: Message edited by: Lunatique ]

[Traa_Vuz]

did u install any new app or driver ... i once installed the new via drivers and i got that exact problem ... all it took to fix was to go into safe mode and uninstall recent install of said driver.

PS: if you re install win2000 without formating you will not lose anything but also i doubt that reinstalling will solve your problems.

[[666]Flat]

BUY ANOTHER BIG HARD DISK. BACK UP EVERYTHING ON IT ON A REGULAR BASIS, INCLUDING AN IMAGE OF YOUR ENTIRE MAIN HARD DISK. Never store you data on only one disk. Remember: hard disks may crash anytime.

Never had to reinstall my Win2k tho, and I got a damn whole bunch of shit running on it for a long time.

And it's runnin' stable too.

[ June 22, 2002: Message edited by: [666]Flat ]

[Lee Yiankun]

That's why Backups are nessesary.
The most effective backup scheme I came across is to backup by DATE. Even if the doccument isn't finished, you still put alot of work into it, don't you?

I bought a CD-Writer last year and never look back since ^_^
Almost all of my files(yep, junks and the likes) are with me in my CD backup. I've got almost 40 backup now. gotta try to index them soon.

[Lunatique]

I did try to reinstall without formatting, and it didn't do shit. So, I had to reformat.

Hehe, I do have another 40 gig hard drive. I have most of my stuff on there. And THEN, I have ALL of the contents on that backed up on about 50 CD ROMS.

How's THAT for safe, huh?

This time, my only shortsightness was not backing up My Document folder for 2 weeks straight, and also not backing up my Maya files, wich happens to locate in My Document.

As far as writing a ghost image of my OS, I find it almost pointless, as it only saves me time from reinstalling the OS, and I'd have to reinstall all of my apps anyways.

[HawkOne]

Wow, Flat ... you said it man ... I think that is the best thing I've ever seen you write.

Luna, you seem to have an unfair amount of shit happening to you and your "puter" man ... Not even my Win98 friend who always bugs me about " I think I just accidentally deleted the registry or something, could you come over and have a look ?" has issues this often.

Maybe you're one of those "magnetic people" who just fry anything electronic they come near ... heheheh ... You should buy one of those storm-trooper suits to shield your gear from your harmful rays ... heheh

Learn about Dual-booting, or even triple, install your Win2000 on 2 separate partitions with say 5 Gigs each, Use Norton Ghost or similar software to just save your entire OS to that "backup partition" every week or so. I#m not sure why you say you need to reinstall applications anyway when using Ghost, because that is not the case, your whole OS will just magically rewind until the date you last backed up, so unless you installed all your applications after your last backup, you should be fine. There is also a program called DriveMapper (comes with Partition Magic) which will reassign driveletters if you should so need, and an NTFS based OS will let you reassign driveletters too, so there will be no broken links between the registry and your applications on other drives. If, or should I say "when" in your case, something goes wrong, you can just switch to your other hidden OS partition and hide the screwed one using PartitionMagics boot disk, and continune working from there. Kind of like the logger who jump from one log to the next when they are floating timber down the river It's all good. Drives die sometimes too though, so if you want to be really prepared (read paranoid), use Ghost to back up onto a separate hard drive too. Chances are that you've uppgraded your crummy old 9 Gig hard-drive with a cool new 60 Gig, and that 9 Gig drive is just collecting dust in a box under the bed. Plug it in and fire up Ghost again and backup your entire OS drive, unplug it and stash it back under the bed where it belongs. Always try to keep OS-type software on one drive\partition and Applications such as Maya or Painter on separate drives and or partitions. The same goes for your work, keep it separated.

Also remember to back up your email archives \ addresses and if you're like me, prefer not writing in those damned login\passwords all the time back up your Cookies directory too, and don't forget your Favorites folders too ...

After my traumatic bootsector virus experience in 2000, I learned that this is a good way to be disaster-proof. There is little you can do to protect yourself agains viruses that really hurt, both Norton and McAffee would have you think otherwise of course, but I prefer to be careful instead of putting even more crap onto my OS drives ...

Visit
Winternals Webpage and Sysinernals Website and see what you could \ should be doing to safeguard yourself. Some of these solutions can be found online so you can try them out (hint - hint)

And live happily everafter ... hopefully ...

[ June 22, 2002: Message edited by: HawkOne ]

[Dr. Bang]

WHY THE FUCK DO IAN JONES AND HAWKONE ONLY GOT 4 STARS?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! EVERY ONE VOTE 5 FOR THEM NOW. I LOVE THESE TWO SO MUCH!!!

[jr]

i use to have 5 stars, then i gave a harsh crit to a newby and well, f the star system!

[HawkOne]

Heheheh ... Dr. You're making me blush ...

[sfr]

quote:

---

Originally posted by HawkOne:
Maybe you're one of those "magnetic people" who just fry anything electronic they come near ... heheheh ... You should buy one of those storm-trooper suits to shield your gear from your harmful rays ... heheh

---

I'm one of those people too! Last month, my 60 GB IBM hard drive crashed, it was 5 months old. Everything on the disk was lost, it had to be replaced. A few months earlier, I had two 256 MB memory sticks that both(!) were faulty and had to be replaced. Last week, my Mac suddenly started crashing and then decided it didn't want to boot up anymore. I'm waiting to hear what part is to blame this time (at least it's still on warranty, which is very lucky because Apple charges illegal amounts of money for their parts).

I swear, I don't do anything nasty to my computers - I treat them nice, give them fresh air, talk to them when they're feeling lonely, etc.
So it has to be my special aura. In fact, it has one more feature - I can make my dual Athlon PC overheat just by thinking about it. But lately, when I haven't been thinking about it, the machine works like a charm. I guess the lesson here is the regular superhero comics stuff, learn to control your powers and all that

Saffron

[Ian Jones]

Hey, I really don't deserve 5 stars man. My painting skills are pretty pathetic. I only like to pass on what I've learnt here. I'm pretty sure that I don't spurt shit though, but if I do let me know.

Btw: Did you know that apparently there is some sort of bacteria that actually eats the plastic on the writing surface of cd's! no joke. There is also a bug that lives in aircraft fuel! it eats the fuselage lining! So just remember when your having your in-flight munchies, your not the only one!

[lel]

Almost poetic reflections over IBM's 75GXP Deskstar-range of harddisks (nicknamed Deathstar due to their above average "live fast & die young" attitude).

And yes, install windows on one partition, and everything else on another. Windows can die on you for no apparent reason at all. If you need to wipe the partition and reinstall it, you will still have all your files left.

True, most applications must be reinstalled anyway to work, but important files will still be left (like, say the icq-database or custom PS-swatches that you should have saved in "My Documents").

Speaking of which, yes, change its location from C: and put everything you do in that folder. If you don't have a RAID0 setup(mirror everything), you know atleast to backup My Documents since all your uniqe files will be there (RIGHT?).

If you have another harddisk in your computer you could copy My Documents on regular basis in case of a disk crash. But since the computer could be stolen (with both disks!) or a virus could wipe 'em both, use CD-r's or tape too. Keep them somewhere else since the building could be burning tomorrow.

If you have fast internet access and reasonable amounts of data, why not mirror the backup-diff to a friend (also with i-net)? It can be automated, burning CD's cannot (well), and therefore it won't be done. And make sure the backup procedure is correct by trying to recover files before they're lost forever and the backup turns out to contain just one empty folder.

(...and I'm not doing half of this stuff myself)

[Lunatique]

HawkOne- Yep yep yep. I'm one of those. Ever since I bought my first computer in 98(PII 400), I've been having serious problems. Now, with this new puter(P4 1.5), I'm still having weird problems.

Man, I can't believe you still remember I had a 9 gig HD! Good memory! I have two 40 gigers now, and it's a whole different puter.

I didn't know ghost actually could bring back all of yor osftware installs. I ought to try that.

The thing that bugs me is that I can't figure out where the problems are. I'm definitely not some inept tech moron, since my best friends are techie gurus that work as IT engineers, and I learn lots of cool tricks from them all the time. They practically taught me everything I know.

Thanks for the info and the links!

Dr. Bang/jr- you guys still care about the star system? Ever since I turned it off, I never notice them anymore.

Bang, you whore! You can only love ME!

sfr- my powers can't be stopped, especially around cute chicks.

Ian Jones- at least the bugs have tastier food--we get crappy airline food.

[Lunatique]

lel- I've changed the root of My Document to another partition now. I always save all of my Photoshop/Painter customized tools/actions. But I was an idiot for forgetting to do that with Maya. . ..

[Trance-R]

Arg... I skimmed the posts, but not sure if this has been mentioned...and too late already..
But Win2k has an emergency repair untility on the CD. If you booted up from CD and run that emergency repair it should do the trick. It worked before when I couldn't boot.
G'luck w/ yer new OS.

[Lunatique]

Yep, tried it and nope, didn't do jack in this case.

[James Bradford]

What is the last thing you installed? The same thing happens to me when I attempt to install Easy CD Creator 5. It halts every time! Boot into safe mode (if possible) and see if it lies within something you installed. I was able to narrow it down to a peice of software I instaleld for myself after having to re-installed win2k 120932039 times. This is my experience, I hope it helps!

[Sukhoi]

Boot up on a bootdisk and move your Mydocuments content into another folder by Dos. And reinstall.

For a simple and easy solution.

Sukhoi

[lel]

If you use NTFS you need the win2k bootdisks to reach the files from a commandline. And when 2000 died on me due to a dvd-software, I could not access most of my own folders even if I was logged in as administrator! Still don't know why...

[eyewoo]

Just back from vacation... this has become a long thread so I skimmed most of it. Sorry if I'm repeating here.

Perhaps the most critical thing to understand about hard drives is... they will fail eventually -- they die, often without much warning.

They're also pretty cheap these days (my first HD ever, a 5 megger, cost me $3000.00. Yep, that's a 5 megabyte drive. It was made by a company called DaVong... but at that time, going from a floppy drive to 5 megs was a totally ecstatic experience!!!) Anyway, they are cheap today so have at least two in your machine and always save your data files and graphics on the one that is not used for booting.

And of course, ditto on all the backup schemes... whichever works best for you is the best for you, but just do it!

My local guru even suggests having one of those large removable drives to use with Norton Ghost... and then remove the drive so that it's not even in the machine if a virus hits that's smart enough to get at all your hard drives.