HP Recovery Media doesn't boot

[ragenitro6]

Yeah I tried the fixmbr and fixbcd and not it's getting errors......

My mission now is to see if I can get a handful of files off this thing before I do a clean install.....

Also with testdisk there are no drive letters assigned - I'm guessing since it's a Linux program looking at the partitions

Nothing is labeled as C: 😧 etc

[Paul_Tikkanen]

If you just let W8 install over the current W8 installation (don't format or delete anything), Windows will create a windows.old folder.

After W8 installs, you can easily get any files you want from the windows.old folder and copy them to the new installation.

I do it that way all the time.

I open the windows.old folder, find my user folder, open that, and then copy the files I want over to my new profile.

[ragenitro6]

I'll try that if I'm unable to get the files I need.....I would have perhaps thought doing that would just keep the Windows folder....and not the Users folder, documents folder, etc....but good to know....

Thanks for ALL your help.....hopefully I'll get this thing up and running soon....

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Anytime.

Glad to have been of assistance.

Yes, the Windows.ol folder keeps everything.

Once you get the files that you want out of the folder, you can delete the Windows.old folder by running the disk cleanup utility.

When it gets to the disk cleanup window, click on the Clean up System Files box on the lower left side of the disk cleanup window.

It will run again, and the next time it comes to the disk cleanup window, you can check the boxes to delete the files.

One of them will be the Windows.old folder.

Then defrag the hard drive.

[ragenitro6]

Well I managed to get a bunch of files off of it - but still had a long way to run so decided to abort the Linux file recovery and I inserted the Win8 USB -- now it comes directly to a screen that says

Recovery

Your PC needs to be repaired

The boot configuration data file doesn't contain valid information for an operating system

File \Boot\BCD

Error code: 0xc0000098

You'll need to use the recovery tools on your intallation media.  If you don't have any installation media (like a disc or USB device) contact your sytem administrator or PC manufacturer

So i'm beginning to think this things possessed haha  just kidding

What started this whole thing was he was upgrading to Win 10 (free upgrade) several months ago....and by what I saw online, the fact that my error message has a blue background, that means the system thinks it has Windows 10...

I read if this was Windows 8 error, the background would be white.....not sure if this matters at all, but....just sayin

[Paul_Tikkanen]

That PC is posessed!  LOL!

What should happen is when you boot from the W8 installation media, it should load files, and in less than a minute, come to the install now screen and when you click on that button, you should begin the installation process.

[ragenitro6]

LOL yea - in a perfect world........

I was hoping it was downhill from here......

Must be something wrong with BCD......I'll run testdisk again and see if that tells me anything....

Do you know which partition I mentioned should be ext partition and which partitions sould be primary and/or active etc

[Paul_Tikkanen]

The OS partiton is the one that Windows is installed on.

That would be all I know about that.

This is mind-boggling. 

I have always been able to boot from installation media, and no matter how screwed up the HDD is, I can get Windows to install, by following the usual steps.

If I want to delete partitions, I select the drive options>advanced menu once Windows is ready to install.

[ragenitro6]

Yeah I'm a bit baffled on this also......especially since it let me get to the recovery options last night.....before I got the drive is locked error....

I'm gonna try using Macrium Reflect to see if it will recover the partitions correctly....

[Paul_Tikkanen]

I'm using Macrium Reflect right now to back up my wife's PC.

Works great.