Can I Replace Corrupt Windows 7 Pro System Files?


  1. artmanphoto
    Posts : 77
    Windows 7 Professional 64 Bit
       New #1

    Can I Replace Corrupt Windows 7 Pro System Files?


    I apologize for this long post but I wanted to give all of the information.

    I am using Windows 7 Professional SP1 32 bit on a desktop machine. I run ESET NOD32 Anti-virus 5.0 and Comodo Free Firewall in the background. I do a weekly manual scan with Malwarebytes Anti-Malware and Super AntiSpyware. Malwarebytes has never detected a threat and Super AntiSpyware detects about 130 threats each week. My start up folder has 5 programs that start up and run in the background.

    Recently the machine has become very sluggish, some programs take a very long time to open and when I am using various programs they sometimes stop responding but sometimes they recover by themselves if I wait long enough.

    A couple of days ago I ran sfc /scannow from an elevated command prompt. After it ran it said that it could not fix several corrupted Windows files. I looked in the log file and I didn't understand what I was reading and I couldn't tell which files were corrupt or how to fix them. I ran sfc /scannow a total of 3 times rebooting after each time and each time it told me it could not fix several corrupted Windows files.

    I was surprised that when I ran sfc /scannow that it did not ask me to insert the Windows 7 installation CD so it could replace the corrupted files. When I would run sfc /scannow on my Windows XP Pro machines I always had to insert the XP installation CD so it could copy files from the CD into the machine.

    Today I booted the machine with the Windows install CD and selected "Repair". The "System Recovery Options" screen appeared. My choices were:

    - Startup repair
    - System restore to an earlier point in time
    - System image recovery
    - Windows memory diagnostics
    - Command prompt

    The machine starts up OK so there were no choices that apply to repairing Windows. When I was running XP Pro the system disk would actually do a repair action.

    I am thinking that the cause of the sluggish, some programs taking a very long time to open and various programs sometimes stop responding may be caused because of the corrupt Windows file sfc /scannow couldn't fix.

    Is there a way to replace the corrupt Windows 7 corrupt files that sfc /scannow says it cannot fix?

    The other option is to do a complete clean install of Windows from scratch. Not too much fun as I will have re-install all of my software and re-option everything.

    I would really appreciate anyone's help.

    Thanks!
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  3. seavixen32
    Posts : 7,730
    Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 64-Bit
       New #2

    Welcome to Windows Seven Forums.

    A repair install is your best bet, as this tutorial explains: Repair Install

    It shouldn't affect your personal data or installed applications, but I'd make sure anything important to you is backed up to an external media first.
    Last edited by seavixen32; 20 Nov 2011 at 04:46. Reason: Spelling error corrected
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  4. whs
    Posts : 26,210
    Vista, Windows7, Mint Mate, Zorin, Windows 8
       New #3

    I was surprised that when I ran sfc /scannow that it did not ask me to insert the Windows 7 installation CD so it could replace the corrupted files.
    This is because the system has shadow files for many of the important system files from where they can make a copy/repair. But since they do not have a shadow for every system file (e.g. drivers), some cannot be repaired. Therefore the suggestion that Andrew (seavixen) made is your best bet.
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  6. artmanphoto
    Posts : 77
    Windows 7 Professional 64 Bit
    Thread Starter
       New #4

    Thanks for your help. I will try this tomorrow and report back.
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  7. artmanphoto
    Posts : 77
    Windows 7 Professional 64 Bit
    Thread Starter
       New #5

    I did the Repair Install today and everything went well. I will have to monitor my machine for a couple of days to see it the issues explained in my original post have been fixed.

    Brink and whs, thanks for your help! Have a great week.

    Bill
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  8. seavixen32
    Posts : 7,730
    Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 64-Bit
       New #6

    Pleased to hear that your repair install went well.

    Thanks for the feedback and post back if you need further help.
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  10. whs
    Posts : 26,210
    Vista, Windows7, Mint Mate, Zorin, Windows 8
       New #7

    Good deal. Andrew's suggestion seems to have done the trick. Have fun Bill.
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  11. artmanphoto
    Posts : 77
    Windows 7 Professional 64 Bit
    Thread Starter
       New #8

    You are very welcome!

    Bill
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