System recovery starts on his own, but doesn't do anything, so I thought about install Win doing 'upgrade' like it shows here: Repair Install
but it says "You cannot do a repair install at boot or in Safe Mode."
What should I do to repair it without losing my data?
Repair install can only be run from inside windows. Try the milder options first- boot from the dvd and run sfc scan, startup repair, system restore and chkdsk.
SFC /SCANNOW : Run in Command Prompt at Boot
System Recovery Options
Check Disk - chkdsk - Vista Forums
You can also run the hard drive diagnostic for your brand.
If nothing helps, easiest would be to boot from the dvd (preferrably a pe or linux or activedisk kind of disk because that gives you a gui though you can use the win7 dvd or system repair disk as well), copy off data to an external drive then reinstall windows.
If this is an OEM install, check the recovery options- there may be a non-destructive one available. Although I personally always assume the oem restore is going to wipe all data, no matter what it says.
Kennasd
Welcome to the forum
If other suggestions did what you expect then try the following:
If you have a USB HDD in spare, try to remove the internal one and replace it with the external then put your DVD copy in the tray and install your system on it.
When finishing that, reattach externally the removed HDD to the computer and extract your files from.
Good luck
PS: sorry if my post crossed with Bill2 one.
Then doing upgrade will erase my data?
I already did "sfc /scannow /offbootdir=e:\ /offwindir=e:\windows" ( since only sfc /scannow doesn't work ) and it didn't found anything.
Also startup repair sometimes tell "..\system32\drivers\AMDXATA.SYS is corrupt", sometimes there isn't any error.
System restore doesn't find anything, but I know there were before.
I started chkdsk from the 'open file' from the eula.txt that compare when startup repair want to send info at Microsoft, so I really can't say it was well done, but it took almost 8 hours ( but in the ends it didn't shown any info, neither if it was finished )
And I don't know what the 'OEM install' is!
Don't know how to do it
If your data is important to you, that should be your priority. OS's can be installed and reinstalled. Once you've backed up data you can just clean install.
Check the hard drive with the manufacturer's diagnostic tools.
Hard Drive Diagnostics Tools and Utilities (Storage) - TACKtech Corp.
HD Diagnostic
If you have a External HD, you could copy & paste your data.
Copy & Paste - in Windows Recovery Console
Kennasd
Before we continue, I would like to ask some simple questions:
Did you perform what theog said?
Did that work for you?
Do you have your recovery DVD for your system?
And what kind of USB HDD do you have and the capacity?
Thank you everyone, now I borrowed an external HD and I will make a full backup, then reinstall Windows.
I still hope to no lose my configured program and all!
However don't close this topic already: I fear I'll need it later
:)
Well, I surely need it again !
I chose custom ( upgrade wasn't even an option ) and selected the old partition.
I was after the *9 in Clean Install Windows 7[2]=General%20Tips but restarting, instead of continuing with the installation, has restarted the startup recovery. The next time I wanted to retry it and then choose to boot from the disk after the restart of the *9, but the *9 doesn't even arrive! ( file corrupted just after pressing next )
Now I'm thinking of choosing format or delete in *8 ( don't know the difference ), but maybe the problem is more complicated.
The scandisk would take about 8 hours, so I won't do it now.
Maybe should I tell how the problem is started?
The PC has 2HD in RAID1 ( settled before an O.S. was installed, so I think in the motherboard ). After a power loss the RAID was gone, but I was working on one HD like before the power loss. Then I re-settled the RAID in bios, and instead of Windows has appeared a black screen with many 'fixing problem', I think it was a scandisk; and then started the startup-recovery ( always restarting the pc ).
So before resetting the RAID in bios it worked, and I tried ( although don't know if done correctly ) to start only with one HD ( disabling the other from bios, because I don't know how to do it manually on the hardware ), and I've tried this with both of them, but startup-recovery was always there, restarting the pc.
Sorry, but I need an answer :)
Format or Delete?
Now I have 2 partition: the starter ( 100MB ) and the RAID.
If I click Delete to both of them, then I can install Windows, right? Or should I click New and set something?
Thank you.
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