Vista Boot Repair Problems!

Sorry, but I'm too nervous about getting a virus to try any of those. It seems to me that a Vista DVD would be pretty likely to have been tampered with.
 
Fregley, I don't blame you there, but we can't give out install.wim... we could get in trouble for that.

See if you can download an iso off MS's webiste of the anytime upgrade or trial for Vista. I would think they would offer that. You should be able to put in your product key to activate it to the full functioning version.
 
I just installed WAIK for the VistaPE thing. I did a search for bootsect in drive C and found one in the WAIK folder. It's about 96kb. Does this sound like the file I need? If I could access it from the Recovery disk, could I just follow the steps in the wiki?
 
WAIK provides SOME of the install files for Vista but not all of them. A disk created using it will probably not work for installs.
 
I'm not planning on creating a boot disk from it. I'm just wondering-if I were to boot off the recovery cd from neosmart and have a disk with bootsect.exe in another drive, could I use the steps in the wiki to repair the boot using that bootsect rather than directly from the recovery disk as the wiki directs?
 
ImageX (part of WAIK) allows you to mount .wim images for modification. Like we're doing here to create the new image if CG/MS approve, you can just addin the bootsect.exe file. Heck EasyBCD already has it in its bin folder so you could probably boot from the recovery disc we already have here and use it like described in the wiki except you'll need to specify the correct location. Assuming your installation is on C:

Code: 
cd /d "c:\program files\neosmart tehnologies\easybcd\bin\"

After you've got to that dir, you should be able to use bootsect simply with:

Code: 
bootsect.exe ...
 
OK. Thanks. I have another question now. If that doesn't work and I get VistaPE working, would I be able to copy the EasyBCD stuff from program files and run it from VistaPE? I doubt that I would be able to install it again on the non-working computer.Essentially, I'm wondering if there are any files EasyBCD needs in order to run that aren't in Program Files?
 
Copying/using bootsect from VistaPE shouldn't be a problem. EasyBCD can run assuming its dependants are installed. I don't know yet about EasyBCD. If you read my above post I confirm that it may, but havent done testing to confirm yet. Report your results if you do get it working though so we know.
 
You need to install .NET to use EasyBCD - VistaPE doesn't have .NET so you can't use it from there.
 
I copied bootsect to my C:\ directory with vistaPE because its command prompt didn't like the command 'bootrec.exe /fixmbr'. I then rebooted and started to do the steps in the wiki. When I entered the line 'c:\bootsect.exe /nt60 all /force', the text "Target volumes will be updated with BOOTMGR compatible bootcode." and two line down "C: (\\?\Volume{" and then a long string of letters and numbers that I assume is a serial number. I've been letting it run for about 15 minutes now, and still no change. The same thing occured when I ran the command from VistaPE.

Do I need to have bootsect in a separate drive from my windows installation? Is it normal for it to take that long? Any suggestions?
 
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Computer Guru said:
You need to install .NET to use EasyBCD - VistaPE doesn't have .NET so you can't use it from there.
Click to expand...

Rats! My hope was that since Vista didn't require you install it normally that it would be included with the build unlike all the stuff you haft to do with BartPE...

Good to know though. Just means I'll need to do some research for stuff that could be used to slipstream it into a VistaPE build.
 
Anyone have any helpful ideas? I just tried this from the microsoft website, but it didn't work.

  • bcdedit /export C:\BCD_Backup
  • c:
  • cd boot
  • attrib bcd -s -h -r
  • ren c:\boot\bcd bcd.old
  • bootrec /RebuildBcd
How do I get bootsect to work? (see earlier post)
 
Assuming your boot files and Vista is on c:

Code: 
cd\
bootsect /nt60 C: /force

Run startup repair too... just in case the rebuild didn't write boot instructions to the mbr.
 
That provides the same result as it did before. No change.

Is there another program I can download to fix Vista besides EasyBCD since I seem to be having troubles with command prompt?

Addendum:

Isn't there a program or something that can convert a .Net application to a native one? That way, Easy BCD would work for anyone.
 
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Nope. Everything has to based off something as is the .net being the common choice for use with developing Windows applications. Things well become more "native" as time goes on (like .net already running under normal Vista).
 
Are you sure? I don't claim to be an expert, but just googling it, I saw Xenocode and some other stuff that claims to be able to convert .net applications into ones that can run anywhere. I could just be totally misunderstanding things, though.

If that doesn't work, what would you recommend I do? I'm not familiar enough with fixing Vista to know very well on my own.
 
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