Windows 7: What's with this "Startup Repair"?

I have a little HTPC running 7 with WMC. It's doesn't do anything else, in fact since its remote has a mouse "twiddle pad", I don't keep a mouse or keyboard connected.

So I go to show a friend how it works, start it up and get this "Startup Repair" window. It has a close box and a Cancel button. but they only produce a popup window with "cannot be canceled" message.

So it runs for about an hour, then it says cannot fix the problem. I look at all the "tests" it ran and it found nothing amiss. So I crossed my fingers (I have Vista too) and restarted. Behold it started up and ran perfectly.

Does anybody know what "Startup Repair" does or even if it has ever fixed anything?

My friend was not impressed.

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Windows 7 Home Premium
Foxconn A88GMV AM3 AMD 880G HDMI Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
AMD Athlon II X2 260 Regor 3.2GHz 65W Dual-Core Desktop Processor
Crucial (2 x 1GB) DDR3 1333 (PC3 10600) Dual Channel
Western Digital Caviar Blue 320GB 7200RPM SATA 3.0
SeaSonic SS-300ET 300W PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply
Rosewill RNX-G300EX IEEE 802.11b/g PCI Wireless Card
Adesso ARC-1100 Vista Infrared Remote Control
SILVERSTONE Black ML03B Micro ATX Media Center

Have a looky here pal Startup Repair FAQ

Hi keepitsimpleeng and welcome to SF!
Take a look here for all the info about. It is a visual and informative step by step.
Hope that helps!

Been there, done that, all pain, no gain.

That's about how to do it intentionally.

This was unintentional and seemingly purposeless.

There was apparently nothing wrong when shutdown prior to Startup Repair, apparently nothing wrong on restart after Startup Repair, and Startup Repair reported it found nothing wrong as well as it couldn't repair it when it ran.

So why did it run? Does it keep its secrets or just hide them somewhere?

Anybody know?

If Windows detects problems during startup it will autofailover into Startup Repair. Sometimes this will fix it, other times you'll need to run Repair from DVD or Repair CD if the files used for Repair are also compromised.

If you will post back a screenshot of your maximized full Disk Mgmt drive map with listings, we can check if there are any problems with the setup on disk. Otherwise you can check the logs and use other diagnostic resources following these troubleshooting steps

Attached is a screenshot, I think that is what you requested..if not let me know.

There have been no problems with the HTPC except this one, and it has been running fine. It has booted and run without problems twice since the Startup Repair foofaraw. I checked the event logs and nothing caught my eye.

Looks like it was an electronic brain fart. I.e. something stubbed it toe and a hysterical Windows called paramedics, the Red Cross and SWAT.

Is there anyway to stop it if it happens again? Or change this default behavior?

This is a new (March '11) computer on new hardware only has avast installed on it, it's not used to browse the net, just Netflix streaming. I don't want to spend a lot of time on it especially to chase MS phantasms. There's nothing on the box so reinstalling it would be easier than tackling a big troubleshooting task.

Thanks for taking the time to reply.

Looks correct. If it becomes a problem a clean reinstall is always a good option, especially if Windows 7 is laboring under all of the factory bloatware. Reinstalling Windows 7

Good advice I say, thank you for your reassuring assistance.

God save us from jello-ware and technical pomposity.