Unexplained system failures.

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Cunjo

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My computer (Gateway Pentium 4 Laptop, Windows XP home edition) has been plauged for the last two weeks with a reccuring problem in which all network related tasks will suddenly crash. following this, If the computer is rebooted It will no longer open any windows or applications. The taskbar icons will load normally, but the programs they run will not. When this happens the only thing I can do to get my computer to run again is to reboot and run a Gateway Goback revert operation at startup of at LEAST 2 hours. This has been happening at least once every 24 hours. It also seems that I have to revert further back each time. In this state of decline it will not be long before I can no longer restore enough to boot the computer. I run Spybot SD, Norton 2004, and Trojan gaurder, and none of them will detect any problems even a mere 20 minutes before a sudden crash of that kind. If anyone could please clue me in as to what might be happening to my system I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you.

-Cunjo-
 
go to internet explorer, tools, windows update, let it scan ur computer and it will list the updates if any that u need
 
Well, Last night I did that and updated, It worked great for about 12 minutes, then the system froze up completely for the first time since the day I bought the computer. I had to force a shutdown by holding down the power button. Now the system will not even get past the goback screen at startup. It will just say "pease wait" and then freeze that way. I can't even get far enough along to start iot in safe mode. and With the gateway store going out of buisness in six days I can no longer use my warrenty to get it fixed. Unless someone can offer some advice I will most likely have to reformat the entire HD without having a chance to save any of the files on it. Does anyone know how I can rescue roughly 30GB of important files from the HD before I erase it?
 
Hey Cunjo,

Insert the Windows XP Cd, hit any key when prompted
to boot from the CD. You may have to change the boot
sequence in the bios if you don't get the above option.

Let it load and relax it is booting from the CD not making
any changes. When you get to the first screen press
enter (setup windows) after accepting the EULA if you only have one partition then select R for Repair, if you have two
partitions than MAKE sure to select the right partition almost
always it's C:\ if you didn't make any changes to the system
since you bought it from Gateway.

This will reinstall Windows XP and all your icons, programs, and
users will be right were you left them.


Note: It is a good idea to go to http://v4.windowsupdate.microsoft.com after this install and check for any security updates.
You will also have to Activate this copy of Windows XP again.

Good Luck.
 
I have made several minor changes to the system, I can probably do without them however, my main concern is the loss of any other data on the computer. what kinds of files will be effected by a reinstallation of the system? I need to be sure that all of my hardware drivers and software stays intact, as well as system prefrances. I used a spywareblaster to take a snapshot of the settings but I am not sure how to revert to those settings using it.
 
Meh, it won't let me edit my posts... I just succeeded in getting i tto start up using the goback CD as a boot disk. I am attempting to revert the drive by approximately 13 hours. Is there a way of Identifying the problem by looking at the log generated by goback of changed files? I want to fing out what is happening, so I can take steps to prevent it.
 
Do this, goto start, programs, admin tools and run the event viewer. If you dont see that goto start, run and type in MMC. check in event viewer for your system log and app log and see what errors are occuring. I think its probably Go Back. Its a turd, in my opinion. Especially if its freezing during the initialzation of gobacks boot partition (it writes itself there). Most of the time its a problem between the antivirus software and goback. It may work fine, but since it writes itself in the boot section, it causes many problems. Unfortunatley, the only option maybe to format/reload (suggest writing zeroes first). You COULD try uninstalling Nortons, and then eventually Go Back, but NOTE: If Goback IS corrupted then it will probably lock up and then you will HAVE to format and reload. May want to goto safe mode (if able) OR use a boot disk, goto dos and copy important files the ol' fashion way.
 
sorry, just noticed you cant get to safe mode. Use a boot disk and do it the ol fashioned way. Hope you have alot of floppies or a zip. There is one thing that MAY work. Try using the command (again in dos) fdisk /mbr (this rewrtites the master boot record where the bootstrap is loaded... IE BIOS info into the VERY first physical sector on the HDD). Now, although it doesn't happen often, this CAN cause complete data loss if the partition/fat table is unstable so DO THIS AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION. For more info, you should be able to just do a search for fdisk /mbr from another machine to get more indepth info on it.
 
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