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Field Researcher
Original Poster
#1 Old 14th Oct 2014 at 2:18 PM
Urgent Tech Advice Needed v2
The following is a direct copy of my thread in the Off Topic section of MTS. Volvenom was kind enough to point me over here. Sorry about the duplicate thread.

If this is in the wrong section, I am sorry. The media center looked more movie/music centered.

I never thought I'd use MTS for this, but my time is limited and the situation frankly scares me.

My Windows 7 64bit all of a sudden refuses to load. I can't enter Safe Mode, normal mode, and startup repair says it can't fix it. I have backup files, but they are over two weeks old. If I can just grab my files, I will be happy.

Since the computer gets stuck on loading atipcie64-sys, my best option seems to be the windows 7 Easy Recovery Essentials by Neosmart. http://neosmart.net/EasyRE/
I've been hearing both good and bad things. I watched the offical Neosmart video on YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mt8Eb1N7frU
When the speaker gets to the part about backing up files, he says you can either upload them to the internet, or burn them onto an external hardrive.
The internet is not an option on that computer, so I went and looked up external hardrives. I found a good one for $50 dollars, but damn, this is not what I want to do. Looking at the video, does it HAVE to be an external hardrive? Can I use a flashdrive or a DVD-RW instead?
I'm not tech savvy. I looked into asking the company, but they've closed the forum for people asking similar questions. Everything has to be done by e-mail now--and their reputation for replying--let alone honoring refunds--is rather murky.
I woud be so thankful for any help.

Again, I'm sorry if this is in the wrong place.

The Possibilities are Endless

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Theorist
#2 Old 14th Oct 2014 at 3:34 PM
I've never used that product. I've had success with Aomei and EaseUs data recovery products, they have some that are free and some that are limited trials.
If your primary objective is just to rescue files off the hard drive, that's usually pretty easy if you have a 2nd computer available. I usually just plug the hard drive into a computer that's already working and see if I can access the hard drive and copy files off of it with Windows File Explorer. The fact that your machine tries to boot is a good sign that your hard drive isn't completely messed up. If you don't have a 2nd computer, see if you can download and find a way to make a WindowsPE boot disk. A WindowsPE boot disk is either a burned DVD or USB flash drive that can boot a minimal version of Windows which should let you rescue files off the hard drive as long as the partition or filesystem aren't corrupted. I was able to make a WinPE boot disk very easily with Aomei PE Builder, although it has to be done on another machine and it won't run on one running Win8.1. You would just boot the WinPE boot disk and copy the files off to another disk if your hard drive is accessible.

If trying to access the disk in Windows File Explorer results in errors or the disk appears empty, then this is what I would do:
1. Download hard drive manufacturer's drive test program and run both the short test and the long test (surface scan). This would be SeaTools for Seagate drives, DataLifeguard Diagnostics for WD, etc. Sometimes the long test (surface scan) is able to "repair" a drive where some sectors have gone bad. I put repair in quotes because a drive where sectors have gone bad is likely slowly dying. Anyway, if it found no issues at all, then you should be able to easily recover your data with a data recovery utility.
2. If after a reboot and drive still seems screwed up, try running a data recovery utility on it. I used EaseUs Data Recovery last time I had a bad drive and it worked to rescue my files (albeit very slowly). There may be better completely free alternatives.
3. If the whole partition is hosed, as in the drive doesn't even show up under "Computer", but it does show up in Control Panel->Computer Management->Storage->Disk Management, then a partition recovery program like EaseUs Partition Recovery may be able to fix it. If it detects a lost partition which is NTFS about the same size used/empty space as you had before, chances are it can fix it. I've had success restoring a hosed partition with it just a few weeks ago.

However, those "next steps" I mentioned pretty much depends on either being able to get the drive into a booting computer, or being able to boot a WindowsPE disk.

Resident wet blanket.
Field Researcher
Original Poster
#3 Old 15th Oct 2014 at 2:36 PM
Thank you for responding, Gnat. I did consider using my old computer to help me, but it is an XP, and I was uncertain whether I could properly connect them. I'm going to copy your reply so I have it on file.

I have some news though: the computer fixed itself without fixing itself! If that makes any sense.

Warning: Long, sleepy ramble ahead:

I don't know how it happend. I ran Startup Repair for the fourth time (the duration being eight hours), and I was given the same message that it had been unable to repair anything. All of a sudden, an HP screen eclipsed the other one. It offered to set the computer back to factory settings. Naturally, I backed away from that option. Before I could click anything else, the computer went dark and then restarted on its own. I kept tapping the F8 button, but the computer did not react to that. Instead it announced that there had been an irregular shutdown and it offered to either load Windows normally, or else go into Startup Repair. I'd been working on this thing for all of my evening and now all of my morning. The prospect of having to shutdown the computer by force (the power button on the tower) was not a happy one, but the only thing that worked. With that future action in mind, I told it to load Windows normally. I stared at the "Loading Windows" image bleakly, feeling sure it was about to freeze up again--but then it asked me to log in! SO THRILLED. I have been backing up all of my files ever since. I just finished up.

My housemates say to take into Geek Squad, but I rather dread that action. I have purposefully blocked all outgoing and ingoing internet access on the computer, and they don't take to kindly to that sort of thing. They also tend to think HP updates are God and turn them back on when you have made damned certain that they are disabled after they have screwed two other computers of past memory. I read about a woman who was so troubled by the prospect of being kept alive on life support that she had DO NOT RESUSCITATE tattooed on her chest. I feel like I should do that with my computer, only the message would be DO NOT RE-ENABLE HP UPDATES.

I have thought about my priorities and have decided to go ahead and buy that external hardrive--that way I can take control of what it saves and try to avoid further problems in the future. My computer is far from perfect, but I have this haunting fear that if I sent it in to be offically fixed, it would come back to me in worse shape than what it left in.

I thank you again for responding, and I will come back and re-read everything to make sure I haven't missed something with my blurry eyes. Thanks to all for reading.

The Possibilities are Endless

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Theorist
#4 Old 15th Oct 2014 at 4:09 PM
Glad to hear you managed to fix it. I'd go ahead and run the HDD manufacturer's diagnostic utility anyway. It won't hurt anything and should tell you if you should be thinking about replacing the drive. If that checks out, go to Computer, right click on the drive, Properties, Tools, and select "Check now" to make sure there are no errors in the filesystem. Once all that checks out, you should be able to use your computer, but definitely make regular backups of important files.

Resident wet blanket.
Field Researcher
Original Poster
#5 Old 17th Oct 2014 at 11:51 AM
The Recovery Drive came back with a clean bill of health. Drive C is going to take a bit longer to test.

The Possibilities are Endless

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