[bubbles]

Hi there, I'm hoping someone out there happens to have a list of XP system files that the transformation pack "WinOSX" v2.1 patches. This is my last ditch effort - of course I scoured WinOSX's website, and Googled around for a good hour. But found nothing.

I installed it on my system. I didn't like it, so I uninstalled it. I started getting nervous when Windows prompted me for the install CD to get original system files. While WinOSX only patches (rather than replaces) system files to update icons, it appears that it actually OVERWRITES the system files to "restore" them. Whether with old versions it shipped with, or a snapshot of the files at the time of installation, I don't know (though I would guess the latter - but if so, subsequent patches and hotfixes would obviously pose a problem).

Well, now my system won't boot. Not even far enough to do a system restore. Booting to "last known good menu" doesn't work either - because, well the system files plus their backups are hosed.

It seems that if I could just find a list of system files that it "restored", I could boot in Linux and copy the files from another machine that is exactly as up-to-date in terms of Microsoft updates, as the hosed system was. If the only problem was wrong system file versions, this should in theory fix it perfectly.

I just don't know what that list of files is.

So: anyone have it?

(This system has been running XP for about 5 years with approx 10 kajillion applications, 3rd party drivers, and codecs installed; pushed way past it's limits with constant multitrack audio production, video NLE, and gigapixel photo editing...and the only time it ever rebooted was to install MS updates! Almost never crashed - maybe once. WHY OH WHY did I install WinOSX? A complete reinstall of XP is totally out of the question, as it took me years to get my apps configed properly [I do keep ghost image backups, but the last one was 2 years ago :-(]. A "repair" reinstall is also sort of out of the question, because as a developer I have an MSDN license, and I'm already +1 over my "activation" allotment [long story but not a nefarious one - I'm within my limits of actual installations, just trying to get my work done in accordance with my license agreement, IN SPITE of MS's DRM bullshit and I absolutely refuse to call Microsoft to politely ASK THEM TO LET ME USE THE SOFTWARE I FRIGGIN' PAID A FORTUNE FOR. Yes, I am transitioning hobbies and entire career to Linux because of this but I still have too many audio/video/photo workflows entrenched in XP for a clean break right this instant!].)

Sorry for the long post - hope the subject gets the basic point across quickly. Thanks!

[jon111122223333]

Have you tried booting into safe mode and try system restore from there? If you have an XP recovery CD, you can install the missing system files onto your computer. That CD will also give you a choice to install the xp critical system files into a separate folder on your computer so you don't have to use the CD if your system files are missing/corrupt (basically a backup copy). That's what I did on mine computer and it has come in handy. If you do have a backup copy, it should be in the i386 folder.

[bubbles]

Thanks for the response. I am not able to get into safe mode, because the original system files are invalid so it doesn't get very far into the booting process.

I don't have a recovery CD. But I do have the original CD, and your suggestion got me thinking more about a repair install. My biggest problem with that route, was the problem of my MSDN license activation. But I was just assuming it would have to reactivate, so I investigated that assumption. Turns out, you can just copy two files that store the activation data (C:WindowsSystem32wpa.dbl and .bak) to a safe place, do the restore install, then copy those files back. Since I also have Linux installed on my system with ntfs-3g (which I did after this problem occurred on an already multiboot system so I could get to my data without removing hardware), this was easy to do. Then I'll have to run all the MS updates again. Shouldn't be a problem. I'm in the middle of it now.

If I run into problems, I'll report back for the record (in case anyone googling this problem stumbles on this). If not, consider it fixed!

[kinsemon]

if you can still access c: (via other methods i.e. command line through cd drive etc.), you can try this:
access x:windowssystem32config. look for the file 'system' (no extension). rename to something else. then select the LATEST 'system_bak_xxxxx' file. rename that into 'system' (again, no extension) then reboot...

[Björn]

Do you get a blue screen or just get stuck in the booting process?

[bubbles]

kinsemon;491438 said:

if you can still access c: (via other methods i.e. command line through cd drive etc.), you can try this:
access x:windowssystem32config. look for the file 'system' (no extension). rename to something else. then select the LATEST 'system_bak_xxxxx' file. rename that into 'system' (again, no extension) then reboot...

OK I tried your suggestion. I did see the file "windowssystem32configsystem" on my XP system parition, but none of the "system_bak_xxxxx" backup files. (Maybe because I did a repair install?)

As for bluescreening vs. just rebooting: it's just rebooting. I tried enabling bootlogging (by editing boot.ini from Linux). It seems it makes it fairly far into the boot process (even well past the dreaded agp440.sys that many people seem to get stuck on including myself quite a bit many years ago on other systems). What it shows is that a bunch of drivers aren't loading. The first one that fails to load is "Did not load driver SystemRootSystem32DriversNDProxy.SYS". There are a bunch of others, including important-looking ones like imapi.sys, redbook.sys, processr.sys, i8042prt.sys, kbdhid.sys, etc.

I know this might getting beyond the scope of this forum. Apologies, and thanks again for any suggestions.

[kinsemon]

bubbles;491548 said:

OK I tried your suggestion. I did see the file "windowssystem32configsystem" on my XP system parition, but none of the "system_bak_xxxxx" backup files. (Maybe because I did a repair install?)

...of this forum. Apologies, and thanks again for any suggestions.

sorry about that. should have been done before messing with/repairing original installation. with all those driver issues you have, i guess you'll just have to do a a clean install. just save copies of your important data files. if you still have a copy of the original wpa.dbl file (win prod activtn), as well as your product keys, well and good.

afterwards, make a backup of all drivers in your system, and store them somewhere safe. there are a lot of utility apps that offer that option.

[bubbles]

kinsemon;491551 said:

sorry about that. should have been done before messing with/repairing original installation. with all those driver issues you have, i guess you'll just have to do a a clean install. just save copies of your important data files. if you still have a copy of the original wpa.dbl file (win prod activtn), as well as your product keys, well and good.

afterwards, make a backup of all drivers in your system, and store them somewhere safe. there are a lot of utility apps that offer that option.

Yeah, I usually do regular ghost images, exactly for the reason that it took so many years to get my system set up for it's highly specific purposes. Unfortunately, I got lazy, my last one is about two years old. (I store all my data on three other drives, my swap file on yet another dedicated drive, and install any large apps such as games on a seventh [the sixth being a 10krpm 'work-in-process' drive]. This leaves my system partition image much smaller than it would otherwise be.) With several PCs most with more than one drive, some drive or another is dying pretty regularly, including system drives--making these system images a must. It makes recovery relatively painless, expecially when a system drive dies (easier to recover from than a data drive with series of full and incramental backups). I've lost two or three system drives just on this PC alone. Then I get blindsided by a friggin' "transformation pack". Shame on me for getting lazy.

Doing a complete reinstall, by itself, is trivial--especially now that I discovered backing up and restoring of the activation file (I was able to back it up). The part that sucks and is not remotely trivial, will be the several MONTHS of reinstalling and reconfiguring all my highly customized and configured apps, drivers, plug-ins, scripts, etc., and getting the wrinkles and incompatibilities ironed out. Just about the worst thing that could happen. (IT-related of course. And like I said, just from the sheer number of drives I own, recovering from dead drives is a near ongonig background task. That's trivial compared to this!)

*All because I installed WinOSX*. (Or more specifically, UN-installed it after having run a few month's worth of Windows updates.) And of course, for my own laxness in not doing regular images. Live and learn. Hopefully others will learn from my experience.

Thanks all for your help and tolerating my sign-off rant! :-)

[razar45]

Yeah,,,,

[Darkelf]

Please,Where is download?