DAMN, I gotta vent - UPGRADING FROM WINDOWS XP HOME TO WINDOWS XP PRO

I dunno if you guys have heard of me, but a while ago I had an assload of problems with my internet in the Networking forums (I really should update my progress there). Long story short - internet didn't work no matter what I did, so I did a Safe Recovery (via HP's Safe Recovery drive) and that really did the trick. Internet restored, and all programs in tact!...

Well, not really. All original programs had to be reinstalled anyway (my guess is that these programs were unstalled when it was Win XP Pro - the Safe Recovery restores my computer with Win XP Home).

So, I was pretty happy for the next two days - I reinstalled everything, leaving the finale to reinstall Win XP Pro...

And I enter the main problem - I get that annoying, DAMN annoying error when I upgrade with "Copy Error: Unable to find <some file>" I'm like "What the hell? The CD is in the frikkin drive!" After some searching, it's due to having Alcohol 120% installed - more specifically, the virtual drives I didn't remove.

But I got a problem. They say "Go and uninstall it". I can't. As in, I'm stuck in an eternal boot sequence or something - during Setup to XP, and I get that error screen - I restart. I start up again on the "setup" again.

I try F8 and do safe mode - it can't cause Windows XP isn't "complete". If I choose to ignore the "copy error" file, I just end up with an unusable system asking me (in it's DOS prompt mode) to reinstall WIndows XP Pro again! Or F8 as it asks me to "boot from CD" leading me to some alternate XP setup screens (which ask me if I want to do something in MS DOS prompt to change the current messed up Windows XP or re-install Windows XP).

I've done nigh everything I could do in this situation. Only a few minutes ago did I stumble upon that MS-DOS prompt thing, and being that was my only option left to see if I could delete Alcohol 120%, I used it to delete the 2 drivers from System32 which cause the virtual drive to pop up on reboots.

That's my last avenue of hope. If that blasted error pops up again (this is like my TENTH time typing in my damn XP Product Key!) I'm just calling it quits for tonight. And cause I'm out of ideas.

I'm sure this Alcohol/Win XP upgrade problem is a somewhat common problem, so if anyone has a solution or an idea I haven't tried yet, I'd love to hear'em!

(I may get it sent to a local PC shop to fix very soon [probably next 2 days] since I need my PC for the next week - but any ideas are definitely appreciated!)

(PS I know I could have shortened this post a lot, but I just REALLY had to rant about this F*&$ing annoying problem. Esp since I've upgraded from Home to Xp before with no freaking problems! *exhale* Yeah.)

 

ARGH! It doesn't work...

Thankfully, that virtual drive is now removed, but it still pops up that "Copy Error" problem. When it does, the only thing I can use to investigate the problem is that I am allowed to browse for a matching file, giving me access to the System Properties, and hence access to the Device Manager.

There are two "yellow exclamation marks" popping up. One is for the Display Adapter (only one 'graphic controller' under it) and the other was the "plug and play bios extension".

The 'plug and play' one I'm sure has something to do with Alcohol. Although I did uninstall it from Device manager, I'm afraid it'll just pop back up again during re-install. Atm I have no clue what I'll do if this pops up again, cause to remove this problem is to delete the right registry files, and I do not know how to edit the registry of windows via MS DOS prompt (typing "regedit" at the prompt doesn't do anything...and yep, it IS there)

I'm checking (FINAL reinstall of the night) to see if the problem is still there after this reinstall. So my question is, does anyone know how to edit a registry via MS DOS prompt where regedit doesn't work?

 

Gahaha! I finally got somewhere! What happened before was that, whenever I got the copy error, I just ignored the files Windows wanted to copy and when I did so, it just looped back to Windows setup. This time however, the loop was broken and I actually booted up into Windows! (although in it's safe mode, hence allowing me to FULLY uninstall Alcohol 120)

Of course, how I got there could have been due to various reasons:

1) cause I deleted the drivers for the virtual drives prior to setup (and even tho I got the copy error again, that alone let me boot up into safe mode, which I couldn't before)

2) I turned ON system restore - I did so when I was able to access System Properties. I didn't realize I had turned if off and forgot to turn it on when I was scanning for a virus rolleyes

3) uninstalling that "bios plug + play extension" in device manager (what i did ni the previous post)

4) God had some spare time and fixed the problem.

Or a combination of the above. In any case, I'm doin one last final reinstall - I'm not too worried now if the copy error pops up again - even if I only get a safe mode, it's more freedom to fix any problem that comes then what I had before!

Night,

Hydra