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Topic: Dual Boot Machine Hangs on XP Welcome Screen After Using GParted

Hi Guys,

Newbie here. I've been scouring this forum but haven't been able to find an answer to my issue yet so am hoping someone can help.

I have a Vista and XP Dual Boot system. My 320GB SATA hard drive was split into 3 partitions - 250GB for Vista, 30GB for Windows XP and the remaining few gig was used by the pre-installed Vista Recovery CD.

I used GParted for the first time today to shrink the Vista partition down to 60GB and give the freed up space to the Windows XP partition (which now stands at 230gb). The Recovery Partition remained untouched.

Everything went well and upon reboot Vista runs fine from the Windows Boot Loader menu. However when selecting XP, I received a "NTLDR is corrupt or missing" message.

Rebooted to Vista and ran a utility named VistaBootPro (very similar to EasyBCD) which showed the XP Boot Drive was pointing to the C drive (Vista). I changed this to D drive (XP partition) and Windows XP boots up ok...until it gets to the usual opening 'Welcome' screen.

There the computer just hangs with the Microsoft Windows XP name and logo. You can move the mouse but there is no disk activity. Rebooted and rried using F8 to go into Safe Mode or Last Good Configuration but the same thing occurs.

Any one know why this may be? Any help would be greatly appreciated! More than happy to post more information if required.

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Re: Dual Boot Machine Hangs on XP Welcome Screen After Using GParted

Hello edge,
three items first :

1. Which Operating System was installed first, before you created your dual boot environment, Vista or XP ?

2. Would you please tell the version of "GParted", you used ?

3. Give us the print-out of
fdisk -lu
(Use "GParted", open "Terminal" window, type above commandline and press [Enter])
This shows current partitioning of your harddisk.

Regards
cmdr

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Re: Dual Boot Machine Hangs on XP Welcome Screen After Using GParted

Good day!

Sorry for booting this thread up but I'm currently having the same problem:
> the computer just hangs with the Microsoft Windows XP name and logo. You can move the mouse but there is no disk activity. Rebooted and rried using F8 to go into Safe Mode or Last Good Configuration but the same thing occurs.

I tried to search for related topics, but am not sure which one to follow.
> Windows lacks login
> Win XP no boot after GP Live partition re-size - new partition OK

I had XP installed first, the Ubuntu. Both were running well, until I decided to resize the partition
due to limited space of XP.
Now, Ubuntu runs fine (I'm currently using), however, when I logged into XP, it gets stuck in the ff. screen:
http://img255.imageshack.us/img255/7317/winxppro2.png

I tried googling around but still haven't found much info that I can follow.
I don't want to risk losing ubuntu as well.

I can still access my XP hard drive from Ubuntu.

I've already downloaded XP recovery CD, however, I'm not sure what commands to run and in what order.
I'll try repairing using XP installation cd.

Reinstallation/reformat of the XP partition is not an option for me (well, for the mean time).

Hopefully, someone will be able to provide support.

So in following this thread (though the questions were not meant for me):
> 1.. Which Operating System was installed first, before you created your dual boot environment, Vista or XP ?
Mine was XP first then Ubuntu.

> 2. Would you please tell the version of "GParted", you used ?
gparted-live-0.4.7-1.iso

> 3. Give us the print-out of
> fdisk -lu
Here you go:

Disk /dev/sda: 60.0 GB, 60011642880 bytes
240 heads, 63 sectors/track, 7752 cylinders, total 117210240 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x0006b163

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1              63    53994464    26997201   83  Linux
/dev/sda2   *    53994465   112390739    29198137+   7  HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda3       112390740   117210239     2409750    5  Extended
/dev/sda5       112390803   117210239     2409718+  82  Linux swap / Solaris

Disk /dev/sdb: 2020 MB, 2020605440 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 245 cylinders, total 3946495 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x27b32fad

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdb1   *          63     3946494     1973216    6  FAT16
Partition 1 has different physical/logical endings:
     phys=(244, 254, 63) logical=(245, 167, 49)

Disk /dev/sdc: 300.0 GB, 300090728448 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 36483 cylinders, total 586114704 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xa3630e67

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdc1              63   204796619   102398278+   7  HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sdc2       204796620   586099394   190651387+   7  HPFS/NTFS

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Re: Dual Boot Machine Hangs on XP Welcome Screen After Using GParted

Hello eastmaels,

Ubuntu uses "Grub" as bootmanager. "Grub" starts "XP" as well. "NTLDR" and its dependencies seem to start ... but are not able to complete their work. This means, that access to the filesystem on sda2 is possible. Otherwise you would have seen nothing but a silent blinking cursor or a black screen. Furthermore, you did not see a BSOD/ Stop fault. "XP" keeps in its registry as well as in its "pagefile.sys" references to the partitioning values of the storage media, it works with. If you resize or move a partition, "XP" does no more recognize the drive, since it has the same DriveID, but other partitioning data. Microsoft thinks, you are doing something illegal and halts the system. To prevent this behaviour, you should have deleted registry key "MountedDevices" and file "pagefile.sys" BEFORE you resized. Now it's too late for the registry, but not for "pagefile.sys". Just rename it, do not yet delete it. Try to boot again; maybe it works now. If it fails, the next step (a new VolumeID) is complex, since Ubuntu also relies on VolumeID. To change the VolumeID, you need latest "GParted Live CD" with "MC_HxEd".  "Grub" does NOT depend on VolumeID,  so that you can use it  to start "XP". Just delete "MountedDevices" in registry, restore the former VolumeID and reboot "XP" successfully. Not until then you can use Ubuntu again, i.e you need an intermediate alternative internet access, if you have problems. Maybe Ubuntu Live CD does the job.

Regards
cmdr

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Re: Dual Boot Machine Hangs on XP Welcome Screen After Using GParted

Hi cmdr,

Thanks for the help!

I tried renaming "pagfile.sys" but no go.

I'll proceed with the VolumeID and post the results.
> If it fails, the next step (a new VolumeID) is complex, since Ubuntu also relies on VolumeID. To change the VolumeID, you need latest "GParted Live CD" with "MC_HxEd".

6 (edited by eastmaels 2009-10-27 17:49:33)

Re: Dual Boot Machine Hangs on XP Welcome Screen After Using GParted

Good day cmdr,

I'd like to get your input first before executing:
> Just delete "MountedDevices" in registry, restore the former VolumeID and reboot "XP" successfully.

Here's what I plan to do:
Step0. Search for Former VolumeID
Since I don't have any idea as to what my former VolumeID was, I looked at my windows registry using chntpw.
-> I remember that WinXP was installed in "F:" , so here's the extracted info (Appendix1).
Q1: Will I be able to use the info I took here? big_smile

Step1. Delete "MountedDevices" using:
I tried to look for ways to delete and here's what I was able to gather:

chntpw <PATH-TO-WINDOWS>/system32/config/system
ls
cd MountedDevices
ls
delallv
q

Step2. Restore the former VolumeID
These most likely are dumb questions, but:
Q2: Will the "former volumeID" indicated here be acquired from the info I got in Step 0?
Q3: I guess this is where "MC_HxEd" comes in to play?
How do I restore? <-- question to self smile


3. Reboot XP Successfully
(Hopefully I will be able to reach this)

Appendix1

offs        size      type   value name                    [value if type DWORD]
[16b774]    236  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{56377ec1-e736-11dc-9a21-806d6172696f}>
[16b8ac]    236  REG_BINARY        <\DosDevices\D:>
[16b9d4]     12  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{56377ec3-e736-11dc-9a21-806d6172696f}>
[16ba2c]     12  REG_BINARY        <\DosDevices\C:>
[16ba7c]     12  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{56377ec4-e736-11dc-9a21-806d6172696f}>
[16bac4]    212  REG_BINARY        <\DosDevices\E:>
[16bb1c]     12  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{56377ec5-e736-11dc-9a21-806d6172696f}>
[16bb64]     12  REG_BINARY        <\DosDevices\F:>
[3adfb4]     12  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{0b6fc4a0-e7a7-11dc-88ce-000d602cc2c5}>
[3aec9c]     12  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{0b6fc4a1-e7a7-11dc-88ce-000d602cc2c5}>
[3c6c1c]    162  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{2490c706-e802-11dc-88d1-000d602cc2c5}>
[4236f4]    160  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{c0d529a0-02ea-11dd-88f1-00042390e408}>
[444804]    162  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{e3dc7ca0-19bf-11dd-8900-000d602cc2c5}>
[44dcd4]    158  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{56f8388d-25bb-11dd-8908-00042390e408}>
[44243c]    162  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{54215d67-4a32-11dd-8919-00042390e408}>
[4494fc]    162  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{54215d72-4a32-11dd-8919-00042390e408}>
[4410cc]    162  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{42c4ce41-51ff-11dd-8920-00042390e408}>
[4876ec]    162  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{42c4ce42-51ff-11dd-8920-00042390e408}>
[588d54]    162  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{eaa95720-8f68-11dd-893a-00042390e408}>
[5a67a4]    162  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{1aab9db0-c07f-11dd-894d-00042390e408}>
[5b3044]    214  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{1aab9db1-c07f-11dd-894d-00042390e408}>
[63d9a4]    212  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{b266ab40-c1a2-11dd-8951-00042390e408}>
[64c724]    162  REG_BINARY        <\??\Volume{5198f652-c90a-11dd-895e-00042390e408}>
[5b16bc]     12  REG_BINARY        <\DosDevices\H:>

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Re: Dual Boot Machine Hangs on XP Welcome Screen After Using GParted

Hello eastmaels,

Step0. Search for Former VolumeID on drive "sda"
Since you are familiar with Linux, we "backup" current VolumeID with "dd"

dd  if=/dev/sda  of=/root/oldVolID  bs=1  skip=440  count=4

Store file "oldVolID" permanently on a mounted USB pendrive. You risk to loose access to Ubuntu, if it's altered during this recovery process.

Q1: Will I be able to use the info I took here?
Q2: Will the "former volumeID" indicated here be acquired from the info I got in Step 0?
Maybe the VolumeID is contained in the UUIDs, I don't know ... and I don't need to know; see above.
Q3: I guess this is where "MC_HxEd" comes in to play?
Since we use Linux directly, we don't need "MC_HxEd" here.


Step1. Delete "MountedDevices" using "chntpw"
"chntpw" is ok for deleting "MountedDevices"; the commands are correct.


Step2. Create new VolumeID for drive "sda"

echo  -n  $'\x58\x50\x30\x31'  >  /root/newVolID


Step3. Write new VolumeID to drive "sda"

dd  if=/root/newVolID  of=/dev/sda  bs=1  seek=440  count=4


Step4. Reboot XP and run Windows "chkdsk /f /r" multiple times 


Step5. Delete "pagefile.sys" (with Linux!) and Registry Key "MountedDevices" again


Step6. Write old VolumeID back to drive "sda" 

dd  if=/root/oldVolID  of=/dev/sda  bs=1  seek=440  count=4


Step7. Try to boot Ubuntu 


Hope, this works for you
cmdr

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Re: Dual Boot Machine Hangs on XP Welcome Screen After Using GParted

Good day cmdr,

Just want to say thanks for your time and help up to this time. Do appreciate it. smile
I think I can already follow the steps you gave.

Will execute the steps this evening and inform you of the results, or post should there be roadblocks.

Will keep you posted.

Thanks!
East

9 (edited by eastmaels 2009-10-30 01:58:00)

Re: Dual Boot Machine Hangs on XP Welcome Screen After Using GParted

Hi cmdr,

Sorry for the late post.

I have tried the steps you mentioned, however it's still a no go - still stuck w/ the Windows Logo screen.
Here were the steps I did:
1. I backed up the VolId of "sda" using "dd" and stored to a USB stick
2. I deleted the MountedDevices using chntpw.
Here's the result inside terminal:

[16b710] \MountedDevices> ls
ls of node at offset 0x16b714
Node has 0 subkeys and 0 values

3. created a new Volid using "dd"
4. Wrote the Volid to "sda"
5. Reboot XP using Recovery cd to be able to execute "chkdsk" multiple times
> Step4. Reboot XP and run Windows "chkdsk /f /r" multiple times 
In the recovery cd I used, the actual command I used was "chkdsk /p /r".
I executed this twice.
6. Logged into ubuntu
> Step5. Delete "pagefile.sys" (with Linux!) and Registry Key "MountedDevices" again
However, "pagefile.sys" still didn't exist, and RegKey "MountedDevices" were still empty.
So basically, I wasn't able to execute this step.
7. Wrote the old VolId back to sda using "dd".
8. Boot Ubuntu
Was able to boot successfully.

Anyway, those are the steps I did.
Do you have any idea where I did wrong?
I'm still studying "dd" but just want to confirm that it should indeed be "sda" and not "sda1" whose VolId I should get and overwrite?

Thanks!
East

P.S. I'll try to do this again w/o using the Recovery CD, but for trial and error purposes only.
I'll also look for any mistep.