Ahhh! Windows Died!!

[calbiterol]

Okay, so about a week ago I was on my computer and it drastically slowed down. It was taking around 5 minutes to even open up Firefox. So I restart it - except it was taking so long to restart that I got frustrated, so I just manually turned off power.

 

When I turned it back on and told it to load Windows (I have a partitioned hard drive with a SWAP partition, Windows on hd0, and Ubuntu Linux on hd1), it gave me the BSoD. It cited this error message: "UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME," specifically "STOP 0X000000ED (0X81B53C98, 0XC000009C, 0X00000000, 0X00000000." When I tried to load Windows in any form of safe mode (after a restart), it stopped loading at multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\windows\system32\drivers\mup.sys . Alphabetically, I believe NTFS.sys would be next.

 

After a few days I managed to remember my Linux password and username combination and eventually gain access to the Windows partition. Ironically enough, I was able to back up (on another computer) all of my important Windows files and documents using Ubuntu Linux. I guess that's what I would call sticking it to the man.

 

At any rate... I cannot boot to a CD (I'm creating the ultimate boot disk, but so far bootables haven't worked), and have no floppy drive. GRUB is my boot manager.

 

HELP!

 

Thanks much!

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

Booting to a CD shouldn't depend on GRUB. It's a BIOS setting. You'll need to go into BIOS config as the computer boots (usually F2 or F8... just hit it rapidly before GRUB comes up) and change the ordering so that CDs are booted to before the hard drive. Then you can try the Windows recovery CD.

[calbiterol]

That's what I tried. That didn't work. Even after disabling booting to anything but the CDROM, it still wouldn't boot - then it threw a "No bootable devices" error.

[Bluenoise]

I've had this problem twice before when having duel boot linux and windows. Those two kids just don't get along sometimes. Never had any problem with windows by itself. Never really tried linux by itself since windows is an absolute necessity for me.

[calbiterol]

Any suggestions?

 

Reinstall Windows?

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

That would be your best bet, but it would also overwrite GRUB (and I don't know if it respects existing partitions). Check for some installing-Windows-with-Linux tutorials on Google.

[calbiterol]

It does respect existing partitions. I was heavily considering enabling the Windows boot loader to load Ubuntu (GRUB first, and then Ubuntu), which would save me the hassle with the CD's. There's a number of ways to do that.

 

Any suggestions on how I might go about saving my current installation?

[calbiterol]

Something just occurred to me - I'll need to boot to a CD to reinstall Windows (duh), but I can't get the computer to boot to a CD (or at least not my windows one, which is definitely bootable).

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

Check that your Windows CD can boot another computer. It may be scratched or it may be corrupt.

[calbiterol]

Yes, it can.

[5614]

That sounds unusual. Can your computer detect that there is a CD in the drive?

 

If so within the BIOS you can firstly disable other startup methods (ie. disable HDD) only leaving the CD, which you did. Alternatively you can change the booting order, so it first attempts to boot from the CD, then the hard drive. The point being it attempts to boot from a CD first - before any other method. If it fails to boot from the CD then it will move onto the second choice (e.g. hard drive).

[calbiterol]

5614 - The first thing I did was put the CD-ROM as the first boot device. This went straight to GRUB every time, which annoyed me. So I disabled all but the CD-ROM. No go, threw the "No Bootable Devices" error. I am not sure whether or not my computer sees the CD-ROM (I'm working on checking that now; it's complicated) but I seem to remember trying to boot from a disk previously and being unable to do so (and my CD-ROM drive was definitely working then.

 

But yes, it seems to be very unusual.

[-Demosthenes-]

I've had this problem twice before when having duel boot linux and windows. Those two kids just don't get along sometimes. Never had any problem with windows by itself. Never really tried linux by itself since windows is an absolute necessity for me.

 

Mine work fine together. On different partitions they really con't mess each other up too much.

 

Stupid windows, if there was something other than itunes that used podcasts well, and I could compile my programs for my computer classes on Linux I wouldn't even have windows.

 

Why do you need windows (both bluenoise and OP)?

[calbiterol]

Gaming, for one. Two, compatibility with school stuff. Three, Sibelius. Four, software. ITunes for me as well.

 

Plus I just don't have the time to fiddle around with switching totally to Linux.

[Klaynos]

tbh it doesn't look like it's a wholy windows problem. Have you tried other boot CD's or boot floppies?

[Bluenoise]

Mine work fine together. On different partitions they really con't mess each other up too much.

 

Stupid windows, if there was something other than itunes that used podcasts well, and I could compile my programs for my computer classes on Linux I wouldn't even have windows.

 

Why do you need windows (both bluenoise and OP)?

 

To tell you the truth I like windows. It never causes me any problems. I'm always pretty skeptical when I hear out people complaining about problems with it. Cuz I've used it for a long time and never had much issue. Maybe I've just learned to use it in such a way that doesn't encourage these things to happen?

 

Plus I work in research and well many of these software apps just aren't there for mac or linux. Or are way to expensive (especially for macs). Plus I have software at school that only works on windows.

 

Mac OS is annoying since it doesn't allow me to do things the way I want. I wont argue this point. Cuz this is just personal preference. I just really don't like how it's layed out.

 

Linux I loved when I used it. But well it's just for to much work setting it up. I have far to busy of a life to deal with that. It has even been difficult for me to find much time to post on this board. I've had to cut out alot of things from my life recently and well that's one of them. Though if I find the time I will go back to using linux.

[calbiterol]

I am beginning to think it might be a CD-ROM problem (in addition to an OS problem).

 

But as far as windows not booting - that's either an OS problem, a hard drive problem, or a file system problem, judging on the evidence...

[-Demosthenes-]

Gaming, for one. Two, compatibility with school stuff. Three, Sibelius. Four, software. ITunes for me as well.

 

Plus I just don't have the time to fiddle around with switching totally to Linux.

 

There is a lot of time involved.

[calbiterol]

I decided to resurrect this for a status report. I fixed the problem during winter break - right after New Year's methinks, although it might have been closer to Christmas.

 

I managed to get Windows to boot after a long an arduous labor of frustration. My CD-ROM drive had also failed. I replaced it with a jury-rigged CD-ROM out of an old laptop that hardly (but indeed does) work, even though it's 5-6 years old, and backed up my files (again). I then reinstalled Windows. The computer seems to be okay and has been running (mostly) stably since then.

 

At this point though, there's no sense in replacing the CD-ROM, so I'm just getting a new computer.