[WAPPRECYCLER]

This morning, for the second time, I sat down at my monitor screen and saw the words (excuse me if this is not exact) - BOOT SYSTEM FAILURE INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER. The first time this happened, I recalled that my daughter had reset her computer system after it being attacked by a virus or something. She lost much of what she had put in the computer after she started using it. I did not want to loose what I had put in. I recalled having read that one way to get a computer to "forget" its malfunction is to pull the plug. It worked. After leaving the computer unpowered for an extended period of time, I plugged it back in and started it up with its problem "forgotten". That was months, maybe even years, ago.

Just before writting this I went through a similar experience. I shut down the power strip into which my computer was plugged in but failed to provide a prolonged delay before resuming power. No luck. I tried again but gave the system a few minutes before resuming power. Again the problem was "forgotten". So now I am typing this message with a couple of questions:

WHAT IN THE BLAZES IS GOING ON?

IF I RECALL CORRECTLY, THIS COMPUTER DID NOT COME WITH A SYSTEM RECOVERY CD. I HAD TO MAKE MY OWN. THE CD's I USED WERE UNABLE TO GET ALL THE INFORMATION ON A SINGLE DISK. IT IS SPREAD OVER 15 OF THEM. WILL THEY WORK IF MY METHOD OF DEALING WITH THE PROBLEM FAILS?

ANY INFORMATION ABOUT THIS WILL BE GREATLY APPRECIATED.

THANK YOU.

[crazy4laptops]

note- caps lock, not necesary all the time

What exactly do you need help with?

Restoring the windows o/s to functionality? Need a cd

Assitance in running a backup for essential files? Linux or another computer with a spare drive slot are options here.

The pulling the plug on computers causing it to "forget" a virus/malware isn't quite accurate. Once it gets injected into startup on the system disk, it's almost impossible to eradicate.

[rgreen4]

Waprecycler - Welcome to the PC World Community. The recovery CD's you created are a second line of defense, the first being the recovery parttition itself. For some reason, you machine is not recognizing the boot device.

Now, the very first thing you should do is to immediately back up any files that you do not want to lose. This is advisable anytime, but especially important when you machine is starting to give trouble.

There are several potential causes of this, one of which is the beginning failure of a hard drive. If this is the case, the only solution is to replace the hard drive and then restore the OS, programs and files.

To fully diagnose this, we need more information:

1. What is the make and model of the computer, and what OS and version (which SP).
2. What Anti-Spyware and what anti-virus programs are you running?
3. How long has it been since you have run a full scan?

[WAPPRECYCLER]

Thank you for your responses.


To answer crazy4laptops. What I seek now is information. The circumstances of this morning's boot system failure may have something to do with the brief power outage my home experienced yesterday. After the outage I booted up the computer with no apparrent problem. I must have put it in hibernation because this morning I found the monitor black except for the boot system failure message. What followed I have already written.


At present I cannot even detect that there was a problem. As for the backing up of essential files, I suppose I should purchase one of these remote memory units that can be plugged into any computer with a USB portal. I have come across the word Linux. I understand it to be an operating system for computers but am unaware if it is in my computer.


I have given an incorrect impression. I do not expect pulling the plug to address virus/malware problems. I expect those to need third party intervention. However, electrical glitches can cause my computer to "take a wrong turn". It seems that pulling the plug has twice caused it to "forget" that it is on the wrong path. I do not recall the circumstances of the first boot system failure problem that I had but suspect that they were similar.


To answer rgreen4.
1. The computer is a COMPAQ Presario SR1910NX running Windows XP Home Edition Version 2002 Service Pack 2.
2. The protection system is Kaspersky Internet Security 6.0. The Norton Internet 2006 that came pre-installed has been uninstalled so as not to cause conflicts.
3. I do not recall when last full scan was run but believe that pulling the plug would not have worked had the problem been a security one.

"Recovery partition"????
I take it from your response that should the "Recovery partition" fail, running the 15 disks in the correct order will restore function as though I had stored nothing in the computer since first starting it up.

Please keep information/confirmations comming.

[crazy4laptops]

the usb remote memory device is called a flashdrive or thumbdrive, buy one that is about 2 gigs or more
linux- (i was suggesting it as a way to back up your files) You have to download linux and burn it to a cd.
Alex Feinmanns iso burner works nicely

I'd recommend pclinux 9.3 or ubuntu 8.04

get a ups that provides basic protection ~ 5-7 minutes. It should give you enough time to shut down the computer without harming the operating system. In the event of a power outage.
the phrases- taking a wrong turn/path and forget used in a vague decription confuses me. I have no clue as to what you are trying to convey in the last paragraph.

[rgreen4]

If you use the Disk Management function of XP, it will show you the recovery partition. Hold down the Windows Key (the one with the flag between Left Cntrl and Left Alt) and hit r. This will open the run command box and type in "diskmgmt.msc" and it will start the applet Disk Management. You can partition a secondary drive but in XP you cannot partition the system drive (Vista will) but will show you the partitions on the drive.

Yes, you are correct, a full restore from the recovery partition will set the drive back to the as shipped from the factory condition, complete will all the "bloatware" it came with. For a brand new drive in case of drive failure, you must use the recovery CD's and they will do the same thing. You can also restore a driver from the recovery partition, but since the machine is about two years old, many of them have probably been updated.

You said you uninstalled Norton's. How did you uninstall it? If you used the Windows add/remove, it won't completely remove it. Norton's is almost as hard to get rid of as some spyware programs. They have a special uninstall program that should be run.

[WAPPRECYCLER]

Again I thank you for the improvement of my understanding my computer and how to deal with it.

To respond to crazy4laptops:

If I am correct, you speak the language of one who could sit down and build a computer. I am one who understands enough to use a computer for communication and research but gets lost, when without a map, in anything technical. I already have a couple of those gadgets that can be put on a keyring. I used one to take data to and from work so that I could more effectively function. In a failure to boot situation, I have no idea of how I could use one to reboot my computer although it would be of use to restore files after having done this. I was thinking more of one of those desktop units that sell for about $100 although I am uncertain as to whether I would need more than a couple of gigs.

"iso burner"? - Will be looking that one up. "pclinux 9.3 or ubuntu 8.04" - I take it that those are linux programs just as Kaspersky Internet Security and Norton Internet Security are protection programs.

"ups" I take to be a power storage unit that will temporarily keep the computer running until I can properly shut it down - assuming that I am home and awake when the power goes down. Problem is that I sometimes put my computer in hibernation while working on something. Unfortunately my computer does not always stay in hibernation until I am ready to use it again. It often boots itself out of hibernation and I return to find the monitor screen on or the screen black and the computer on light flashing.

Sorry about any confusion. In the last paragraph:

"a wrong path" is a malfunction, something like the computer deciding that it is unable to reboot on its own.

"forgetting" is the computer returning to proper function, something like returning to where it knows how to reboot on its own.

To respond to rgreen4:

That is an interesting short cut to the run command box. Will be looking up definitions: "applet"; and, "partitioning a drive".

"Bloatware" - That is an interesting term for all the excess baggage computer manufacturers put into the systems to hook you into whoever is paying them off to introduce you to software that you may or may not want to take advantage of. My biggest problem is that I cannot, with few exceptions such as AOL, discern the "bloatware" from the essentials. I also get the message that if I ever have to "restore a driver" (I take it that they run things like printers, cameras and other add ons) it will be necessary to contact the product manufacturer for updates.

You guessed it right, I uninstalled the Norton Internet Security via the "add or remove" of the "control panel". I have not had any interference (that I am aware of) since. Maybe Kaspersky is blocking any pop-ups that any Norton residual tries to initiate. I am still anti-McAfee after it gave me months of interference on my first computer because I had let my subscription to the version that came with that computer expire before introducing an updated version.

Still do not understand why the "boot system failures" occurred. Never had one on my first computer. It is a Compaq Presario 5BW120 that runs on Windows 98. Had to replace it for internet use because it refused to let me properly install my DSL service (I think that the problem was a driver issue.). The dial-up service prevented use of my phones while on line. It has been pretty much moth-balled since getting the SR1910NX.

[crazy4laptops]

note, pclinux and ubuntu are linux based operating systems. They aren't windows installable programs.

You will only need the iso burner program only if you decide to try out linux

The desktop unit sold for $100 is called an external hard drive. I'd reccommend only a flashdrive because its cheaper and it can hold all of your data (go with 4 gigs for safety)
wait, there is a difference between hibernation and standby-
hibernation turns the computer off completly
standby causes the blinking power light because the computer is running in low power mode
turn off wake on lan on your network card, that might be the reason why your computer keeps waking up while in standby.
Play with the power options (in control panel), to get the setup you want.

[WAPPRECYCLER]

My earlier (Aug 14) reply to your response has yet to be posted in this thread. I wonder why.


To restate, I have long known the difference between standby and hibernation. Standby is a joke from which even air vibration result in powering back up. On the laptop that I had while working for GE, hibernation was a state in which the computer slept to conserve battery until manually awakened. In my desktop hibernation is that iffy status which will or will not keep my computer in sleep mode until I return to wake it or find it awake, whichever comes first. I consider the standby mode with the blinking light to be equivalent to being awake.


Never did find my "network card" or way to turn off "wake on LAN" but did find power options in my control panel. For some reason I have this computer on energy star instead of home/office desk but decided not to change that setting after finding in the Advanced options that my computer was set to go into standby instead of hibernation when I pressed something it called a "sleep button". I did change that to hibernation instead of standby.

Still working on understanding why the this computer has twice - and many months apart - failed to recognize that it did have access to it boot system without me having to use a disc to give it directions. Still know of no disc that will not erase computer memory back to when computer came out of the box and restore any "bloatware" that I have managed to remove.

[rgreen4]

We never did get the basics on your machine - what is the make and model if manufactured, what is the motherboard make and model if custom built.

What Operating System are you running XP (Home or Pro) SP1, SP2 or SP3, Vista (version) SP1 or no SP?

As for the "sleep button" some keyboards have a "sleep button" and have the symbol of a new moon (like on an outhouse door) which when pressed, puts the computer into the hibernation mode. My desktop with a Gigabyte MB and Microsoft Keyboard have this, but when I put the computer into hibernation, the light on the front panel goes off, and the only way to wake it is to press the on button. Some machines will wake on any button, some only on the sleep or on buttons and some only when the on button is pressed.

[BAMT]

"...The computer is a COMPAQ Presario SR1910NX running Windows XP Home Edition Version 2002 Service Pack 2."
http://h20000.www2.h...0695&jumpid=regR1002USEN

[rgreen4]

You are right, I overlooked that. The difficulty in trying to find absolute solutions for an intermittent problem, is if you take an action, you are not sure that it has solved the problem until after it reoccurs sometime in the future. Then you look for another corrective action.

Since this does not seem to occur on cold boot, but when awakening from hibernation, it is apparently the OS looking for something before the HD is ready to deliver. How to prove or disprove is a question and then of course to find a solution. It may or may not indicate a pending problem with the hard drive which is why I urged a backup and keep it current. If this was my machine, I would make sure that every file has an up-to-date backup readily at hand.

While the machine is no more than two years old, I lost one HD that was 2 months old. Fortunately it was in my NAS that was configured as a Raid1, so the mirror was intact, and synched to the replacement drive in short order with no loss of data.

[BAMT]

You may have not found the Wake on LAN settings etc. because they are in your BIOS. Access your BIOS with the [F1] key (on my SR1830NX, probably same) before Windows loads by holding it in while PC is "waking up".

@rgreen: what brand was that HDD? I have 2 1990 Macs (system 7) and a 1994 Compaq Proliant with Seagate HDDs that are all still churning smoothly.

[alchav21]

Rgreen4 is correct, intermittent problems are hard to find, but your computer should not be coming out of Hibernation on it's own. You have to push the start button just like a regular Power On, but it reads information stored on the HDD. You should probably test your HDD, some Bios have this or go to the HP Web Site, this HDD is almost 3 years old and if it isn't a Seagate or Western Digital it's probably bad or will fail soon.

Now the 15 Discs that you have for Recovery probably will not work, so what I think you should do is buy a nice big HDD, back-up all your Data and I just mean Documents, Pictures, Music, and information like that. You have Windows XP Home, so you have a Product Key, all you need is a Windows XP Home OEM CD. Format and load Windows XP/SP3 on the new HDD, load your Data and Programs and you are back on easy street. If you still have 512Mb of RAM you should bring that up to 1Gb.

[Tunz]

If you would like to check the integrity of those 15 discs, there is a nifty little freeware program that will do just that.

http://www.kvipu.com/CDCheck/

It is very easy to use; just start the program, load the CD and press the button.

You will need those disks if your drive goes south and it sounds like that may be imminent.

[WAPPRECYCLER]

In the upper left corner of my keyboard (above the Esc tab) is a button with a symbol resembling a partial moon. I tested it and it almost immediately put my computer in hibernation. The power light on my tower has always gone off when I put my computer in hibernation. It was only when I returned to my computer some time later that I would find that light blinking with the monitor screen black, on with the monitor screen lit or the computer awaiting my activation of the power on button. That "sleep button" is a nice shortcut to Start>Turn Off Computer>Shift>Hibernate. Thanks for the info.

[WAPPRECYCLER]

Thanks for the link to the manufacturer data for my computer. There may come a day when that data will prove needed.

[WAPPRECYCLER]

"Access your BIOS with the (icon) [c-main] key before Windows loads by holding it in while PC is "waking up".". - I did not get the meaning of the icon. It seems to direct me to the start of a new discussion. I take it that you are telling me to press F1 upon turning on the computer after I have turned it off.

I am totally uncertain of what to do once inside my computer's Basic Input/Output System and am afraid that I can really screw things up from in there.

[WAPPRECYCLER]

Your response to Rgreen4 (Post 13 in this thread) appears directed to me but is over my head. I think HDD and HD are equivelent terms but the information provided by the link in the BAMT (Post 10 in this thread) does not appear to identify the HDD manufacturer. As to testing the HDD, I have no idea of even how to begin. This computer has been coming out of hibernation since it came out of the box. I have had an HP tech take over operation (via computer to computer DSL link) of the computer in an attempt to stop that from happening. It continued to do so as if there had been no attempt.

With my luck you are most likely correct that having the recovery disc information recorded over 15 discs will not work. How big an external hard drive? By having a "Product Key" are you telling me that I know the operating system and can thus replicate it via the external hard drive? I have to admit to being awash in confusion at this point.

[WAPPRECYCLER]

I am still lost. The integrity of the discs? What about continuity? You are definitely right about me needing a recovery CD if my drive goes south. I cannot understand why HP dba Compaq did not include a recovery CD with the computer. Why it instead recommends use of "CD Creater" to make a "CD set".

Of one thing I am certain. I dare not put the set of recovery CD's into my computer while the computer is still functioning and I have no idea of what I am doing.