Solved can't recover the MBR after starting factory restore and erasing linux

cavanholi

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Hello there

I have a net book accer with Windows 7 starter which I bought in Italy while I was there.
Since I'm not a windows user, I instaled ubuntu on it but kept windows because this netbook isn't stay with me.

So once I came back I start the recovery proccess. But, surprisingly for me, the recovery didn't rewrote the MBR and now I'm unable to continue it.

Since it is a netbook, it doesn't had a opctical drive neither I had any instalation disk.
I've tried to recovery it with a pen drive with recover console for win xp, to no results.
fixmbr and fixboot didn't work. It say the proccess was successful but at the restart the grub recover continue to show.

So, I'm without option but to try and put a Lilo just to make it boot to windows, but I don't want such 'by-pass' solution.

Any clues?
 

My Computer My Computer

At a glance

Windows 7 Starter 32bit
OS
Windows 7 Starter 32bit
   Information
We always assume you have made your Recovery Disks using the OEM manufacturer's Recovery Media Creator app the first day you had your new PC.
& made the Startup Repair CD.
startup repair disc-create


Did you make the OEM manufacturer's Recovery Disks?


Capture USB.PNG
 

My Computer My Computer

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ME/XP/Vista/Win7
OS
ME/XP/Vista/Win7
Nops, never did any recovery disk. Besides, the only media I had was a 1gb pen drive I used to install linux later. So even if I had it would be erased.
 

My Computer My Computer

At a glance

Windows 7 Starter 32bit
OS
Windows 7 Starter 32bit

My Computer My Computer

At a glance

ME/XP/Vista/Win7
OS
ME/XP/Vista/Win7
First try tapping F8 key at boot to see if you have System Recovery Options on the Advanced Boot Options menu. If so boot into Command Prompt to mark Win7 partition Active using Diskpart: Partition - Mark as Active (Method Two)

Next run Startup Repair repeatedly up to 3 separate times to write the System Boot files to Win7.

If no Repair console on F8 menu, you'll need to find a Win7 Repair CD ISO to try writing to flash stick using WinToFlash, order your Acer Recovery Disks from Tech Support with help to write to flash stick, or locate Win7 starter version ISO to write to 4gb flash stick to use for Repairs or possible reinstall using Universal USB Installer .

Before booting Recovery or Installation stick to reinstall, use Theog's link to wipe the HD of GRUB corruption as this may block all repair attempts anyway.
 
After contacting (without any good) Acer support I finally managed to solve the problem, using RescaTux (here if anyone would need it in the future Rescatux - Super Grub Disk) plus TestDisk (sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install testdisk).

But this problem was really awkward. I had a notebook with Windows Vista which once had dual boot with Ubuntu, when I did factory restore on it, it resized the partitions and rewrote the MBR) but with Windows 7 was different. It remove two logical partition, kept the extended and swap and did not rewrote the MBR.

Anyway, the problem was solved. So thank you everybody for your support.
 

My Computer My Computer

At a glance

Windows 7 Starter 32bit
OS
Windows 7 Starter 32bit
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