1 Topic by Antonino (edited by Antonino 2009-06-27 03:03:32)

  • Antonino
  • New member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 2009-06-27
  • Posts: 1

Topic: [easy workaround] if XP doesn't boot after a move/resize

Hello. I am posting this new thread because it's all day that I am battling with this problem.. finally managed to solve it in an easy way..

Basically I was doing some resizing/ moving partitions on my PCs.. no problems at all, everything fine, except that some OS didn't boot after these operations sad
In the case of Vista it's easy, you just run the install DVD and use the “Repair your computer” utility..

In the case of XP.. the things seems to be more complicated.. after the resize operation XP just didn't boot in any way: only the message "A disk read error occurred
Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart".

I tried to launch some commands from the recovery console (you can run it from the XP install cd): chkdsk, fixmbr, fixboot, bootcfg.. nothing, XP just didn't want to boot sad

I also didn't want to waste too much time, so I managed to solve in this way: I installed a trial version of vista smile

in this way the vista boot manager seems to repair everything.. to tweak the boot menu then you can use the tool easyBCD..  I know it seems very stupid as a solution, but it works like a charm and it's relatively quick.

another tip based on my experience: the problems with booting appear if the data in the OS partition gets moved. So basically if you just add some more space at the end of the partition nothing should happen.. but if the space is before the partition, there seem to be some problems.

Hope this can be useful to someone, if someone has some more technical explanations please post your thoughts smile

2 Reply by jomminum2

  • jomminum2
  • New member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 2009-07-06
  • Posts: 1

Re: [easy workaround] if XP doesn't boot after a move/resize

i've got the same problem. i've resize my c:\ (winXP) from 1xx GB to about 40GB, everything seems ok. But, after reboot nothing to see, just blank screen... i've try everything like antonio did but still no success.
i don't want to install trial vista coz this is my friend's pc.:(

other than send it to pc shop....anyone can help me? plzzz...

3 Reply by cmdr

  • cmdr
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 2008-07-30
  • Posts: 522

Re: [easy workaround] if XP doesn't boot after a move/resize

Hello jomminum2,

what version of "GParted" did you use ? Please use the latest stable "GParted Live ISO".
I suppose, that you are hit by the "Hidden Sector" problem. We need some more informations, and you should be somewhat familiar with "MC_HxEd", which is contained in "GParted".
Look here ("for the analysis") for details.

Regards
cmdr

4 Reply by gedakc (edited by gedakc 2011-01-13 19:30:05)

  • gedakc
  • Developer
  • Offline
  • Registered: 2007-11-30
  • Posts: 4,592

Re: [easy workaround] if XP doesn't boot after a move/resize

If an NTFS file system has the "Hidden Sector" problem, another option is to use the ntfsreloc program to fix the problem.

The steps needed are:

1)  Download the source code ntfsreloc.c.

EDIT:  2011-01-13  ntfsreloc appears to be ntfsfixboot now.

2)  Compile the code:

gcc ntfsreloc.c -o ntfsreloc

3)  Run ntfsreloc on the partition to see if there is a problem:

sudo ./ntfsreloc /path-to-ntfs-partition

4)  If a problem is found with incorrect hidden sector values, run ntfsreloc with the -w parameter to write the updated hidden sector values:

sudo ./ntfsreloc -w /path-to-ntfs-partition

The problem with GParted not fixing the "hidden sector" problem arose with GParted Live versions 0.3.6-1 to 0.4.3-3.  See bug #574389 - no /usr/bin/xxd file.  The cause of the problem is that the GParted application failed to check for the existence of the xxd program before moving a partition containing an NTFS partition.  This problem is fixed with GParted Live 0.4.4-1 and higher.