windows vista x64 recovery disc fails to repair

[lvbaal]

Hello everybody,

following problem:

Windows startup fails because of corrupt/missing windows\system32\ntoskrnl.exe

Repair attempt 1:

Using installation disk repair option:
finds my windows installation, but after selecting it and choosing next it reports: "This version of Options for Repair is not compatible with the version of windows you are trying to repair. Try using a repair disk compatible with this version of windows"


Repair attempt 2:

Using Neosmart Repair disk:
also choosing the repair option.
Log file:
Test performed: Windows Bootlog diagnoses.
Completed successfully.
Root cause found: Boot critical file c:\windows\system32\ntoskrnl.exe is corrupt
Repair action: File repair.
Failed. Error code 0x490
Repair action system restore completed successfully.

After which I restart my system, and encounter exactly the same problem...

Thanks for any help, before I must completely re-install Vista 64.

Leo

[Terry60]

Hi Leo, welcome to NST.
I guess that you have a retail installation DVD with both x86 and x64 Vistas bundled ?
I have an OEM DVD which only comes in one flavour (x64), so is obviously compatible with my installed system. I'm surprised that the retail product doesn't have an appropriate boot option for both OSs, but will take your word for it in the absence of any personal experience.
The x64 CD from this site is working, so I'd use it to boot up and enter the recovery console rather than "repair startup" this time.
In the recovery console issue a chkdsk /f command and leave it running to repair any dodgy blocks on the HDD.
When that's completed (it might take a while) try the "repair startup" again (2 or three times, because it doesn't fix everything at once)
If the system still won't boot after that, get yourself a free copy of a Linux live CD ISO-image, burn it, boot it and rescue all of your user data from the Vista system to some kind of external storage medium, in case your final solution is a reinstall.
(In fact it might be a good idea to do the last step first in case you accidentally do something wrong in the attempt to fix Vista)

[PC eye]

Before a total reinstall if you haven't already started boot with either disk Vista 64 or recovery disk provided here and go to the command prompt option in the repair tools. Type in "bootrec .scanos" to see if the tool lists the Windows installation and press Y for yes. If you see the sucessfully added message use the "bootrec /fixmbr" and bootrec /fixboot" commands.