can't boot at all (including safe mode)

Hi.

This is my first post regarding a problem I'm having on a Windows XP (Pro?) laptop. I am stuck in a login-logoff cycle and do not have a Windows boot disk.

I read your "read me first" file but I don't know how to apply any of the instructions to a machine I can't access.

Any help you could provide would be greatly appreciated. I had just run a program called malwarebytes that found a virus in my userinit file and deleted it immediately prior to the occurrence of the problem I'm having.

It also found corrupted registry keys and removed them. I also had just run CCleaner and also had just updated AVG to version 9.

If it helps, I do have access to a functioning Windows Vista machine.

Please let me know how I should proceed.

Thanks in advance for you help.

 

No problem on moving the thread.

I hope someone here can give me some direction on creating a bootable disc or a recovery disc or whatever might get my machine up and running. I do have the OEM "reinstallation CD" but I don't want to lose all my programs and data and I'm not sure what the CD will do.

Thanks again for providing these forums.

 

How important is any data you have on the hard drive to you?

I'm thinking that if this was my computer I would download an Linux liveCD, then boot from it and back up anything on the hard drive I can't live without, then use that liveCD to completely wipe the hard drive and repartition it. The major drawback with that approach is of course that you need an XP disk to be able to get that operating system back. Alternatively, since you you said you have the OEM's "re-installation CD", you can use a Linux liveCD to get your data burned to DVDs, and then use the re-installation CD, and restore all your data once you have your OS back up and running.

If that second option sounds appealing to you, let me know. I have a few bookmarks to easy and straight-forward Linux distros I can send over. The way I see it, if we can get your important data salvaged from the hard drive, you could use your restore disk to make your computer usable again without having to worry about losing any photos or music.

 

Problem solved !!

Thanks.

The good news is that I was able to resolve the problem.

I'll add the following in case it helps someone else. The problem I had was a login-logoff cycle when booting into Windows XP. I couldn't boot into Safe Mode either and "last successful configuration" was not successful. No matter what I tried, I just kept looping through login and logoff. The problem was caused by a missing userinit.exe file. I lost the file because it had a virus and was deleted by my anti-virus program. The login-logoff loop could also be caused by a corrupted userinit.exe file that's there but not functioning correctly.

The software that saved the day is called Trinity Rescue Kit version 3.3. You can download a free copy (using a working computer) from: http://trinityhome.org/Home/index.php?wpid=5&front_id=12. You need to write it as an ".iso" file to a CD. By booting my computer from the CD drive (after pressing F12), with the Trinity CD in the drive, I was able to use a few simple Linux commands to fix my laptop.

The first step, after making the Trinity Rescue disc and verifying you can boot from it, was to find a copy of userinit.exe. I found the file on my Windows XP reinstallation CD from Dell. If you google the file, you'll find lots of websites to download it from if you don't have a Windows installation CD. Don't boot from the installation CD. Load it after you're already in Windows and copy the file from the CD to a flash drive. The file on the CD was compressed and needed to be expanded. On the CD, it was called userinit.ex_. To expand it, do this (from a command prompt):
expand userinit.ex_ userinit.exe. You need to preface both filenames with the appropriate path locations.

With userinit.exe now expanded and located on a flash drive, you then return to the problem computer. Put the flash drive in a USB port on the broken computer. At the Linux prompt, from the Trinity Rescue disc, type "init 0" to eject the disc and logoff. Reinsert the Trinity CD and then power on the machine again, press f12 (for the boot menu), and choose, again, to boot from the CD.

On the menu that first comes up, choose (up and down arrows) to do a virusscan. This may not be necessary but it made all my drives available later in the process. There's probably a faster way to make them available but this approach seemed to work well. Watch the scan run to learn the "linux" names of your drives. I think you can also type "mount" when it finishes and it will list your available drives. You can get Linux help on commands by doing something like: mount --help.

After the scan finished, I was able to use a Linux command to copy userinit.exe from the flash drive to my c:\windows\system32 directory. My harddrive was called /hda2 and my flash drive was called /sda1. Everything in Linux is case sensitive. I used the following Linux commands to copy userinit.exe:

1. cd /hda2 (change directory to my harddrive)
2. cd WINDOWS/ (capital letters, trailing slash)
3. cd SYSTEM32 (use the "ls" command like "dir")
4. cp /sda1/userinit.exe userinit.exe (copy command)

The "cd" command drills down to the system32 directory. If you "ls" from there, e.g. "ls userinit.exe", you can see whether you have the userinit.exe file in the right place (see registry key below).

At this point, with the userinit file restored, you should be able to reboot into Windows. At the Linux prompt, just type: reboot. This should eject the Trinity disk and boot you into Windows. This worked for me after I restored the userinit.exe file.

If you still have a problem, perhaps your registry is looking for the userinit.exe file in a different location. I didn't need to pursue this further but the registry key that "points to" the userinit file is:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon. There's a subkey called "userinit" that should show the path in which Windows expects to see the userinit.exe file. You can either try to change the path or you can move the file (again). Supposedly, you can type "regedit" at the Linux prompt to begin navigating through the registry. This did not work for me. I got a message that Trinity could not find a valid copy of Windows. If you're able to run regedit, you can use simple commands like "cd" and "ls" to navigate through the registry until you arrive at the WINLOGON key. I think you can use "ed" to edit the key if necessary. I think it would be easier to move the userinit.exe file than change the registry key.

Good luck. It's a long and painful process but it really does work!