PROCESS1_INITIALIZATION_ERROR 0x000000b6

Windows 7 home premium was running perfectly fine. I installed windows 8.1 to an external hard disk, taking care to disconnect the internal hard disk. Both worked fine for a little while.

Later, my dad happened to boot into the Windows 7, and for an unknown reason it went into startup repair. It was like that for more than 4 hours, showing "Checking for disk errors. This might take over an hour.", which could not be cancelled either. Based on previous experiences, I decided to force-terminate the process. When it came back up, it failed to boot due to the lack or corruption of PCIIDEX.sys.

It made slight sense as some configuration probably changed when the other windows was installed, but still should not be major. Right? So I fished around in the \Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository for a PCIIDEX.sys, of which I found 2, both identical sizes and dates. One was in mshdc.inf_amd64_neutral_552ea5111ec825a6\ and the other in mshdc.inf_amd64_neutral_aad30bdeec04ea5e\ .

I chose the "aa..." one since in Hex it would be a larger number, perhaps later version, etc., and put it in Windows\System32\Drivers\ . When I tried to boot now, it failed to boot due to the lack or corruption of MSAHCI.sys.

No problem, found this also in those same two directories, and put it in system32\Drivers\. Now when I booted it up, it went into the booting animation, but stopped just before those 4 blobs of colour converged into the windows 7 symbol and BSODed, stating

PROCESS1_INITIALIZATION_ERROR

0x000000b6

apart from the usual generic Windows BSOD advice.

So I booted to a windows 7 installation DVD, and discovered that

• Startup repair either can't find anything wrong, or, if I try boot, fail, and then boot into installation DVD, it says that it can't repair automatically because SFC fails, with error 0x02.
• Shockingly, there are no system restore points. I don't remember ever disabling it.
• sfc with /offwindir and /offbootdir parameters set to point to my windows 7 installation says that "Windows resource protection found corrupt files but was unable to fix some of them." and then tells me about the log file.
• Initially it was not creating any log file, but eventually set WINDOWS_TRACING_LOGFILE to a convenient location and it created it. It's more than 1MB in size[update: suddenly it's not so big... hmm, still hundreds of entries], and there are a few thousand entries in there, all beginning with [SR].
• I presumed it must be because the I have windows 7 SP1 installed, while the setup disc was of Windows 7 RTM. So I downloaded the SP1 integrated ISO from Digital-river, and ran the same thing. No real big difference.
• The entries are all long hex number filenames, which I read somewhere else, correspond to temp files. I deleted non-read-only files from windows\temp, and Users\<admin user>\AppData\Local\Temp. Did not reduce size of log. Maybe I should also clear ProgramData Temp.

The cbs log is attached. [update: also attached processed log with [SR] entries in separate file]

I would love to do a real repair install, but can't boot into windows to do that. I want to at least force windows to refresh it's driver loading pattern.

I'm foxed now, need some expert help please.

As you are saying, it is STOP 0x0000006B: PROCESS1_INITIALIZATION_FAILED. And it refuses to boot, too. Which rightly means that the boot files are missing for the HDD.

• First make it sure that there is only one HDD is connected to the computer, that one continuing windows 7 only.

• Next make it sure that the 100 MB system reserved hidden partition is marked as active. Partition - Mark as Active. (Method three is the easiest).

• Next, Follow it:
  Troubleshooting Windows 7 Failure to Start
  
  • Or, run Startup Repair for three separate times, with restarts after every single run.
  • Startup Repair: Run three separate times.

Let us know the results.

Be sure about the system reserved partition and post then. It cannot be 1024 MB. And, it should not be unallocated. Similarly, the C drive should not be active in a good windows install.

Do you have access to another computer right now? If so, download Partition wizard Bootable CD (the last one in the link). Burn it in a blank CD or in a USB flash stick.

Boot into Partition Wizards GUI following this instructions. When you are on the last screen, take a camera snap of the screen and upload the snap here.
Screenshots and Files - Upload and Post in Seven Forums

We need to see the partitions and parameters.

BTW, if C is active, then a you can install the bootloader there by following Startup Repair: Run three separate times. It will make the system bootable again.

Good plan.

Partition or Volume - Create New

If you follow method one, do it within windows 8. If you follow method 2, remove the windows 8 disc (as you have to remove it later). Make it sure that you are not assigning any drive letter to that partition.

Next, disconnect the windows 8 HDD. Otherwise the aim will not be achieved.

Now, mark the 102 MB partition as active Partition - Mark as Active. (Method three is the easiest).

Then, run Startup Repair for three separate times, with restarts after every single run. it will install the bootloader (Master Boot Record) in the active partition.
Startup Repair: Run three separate times.

Let us know if the windows 7 installation is bootable now or not.

Nope. I created partition, marked it active, ran startup repair, which failed to recognize the presence of anything. So ran bcdboot and bootrec. Then ran startup repair maybe aroun 6-7 times, first few times was to try to force setup not to assign really random Drive Letters, but failed. I then just gave up and ran it just like that.

Startup repair says it cannot solve the problem automatically, the first time. Then it says there seems to be no problem. If I restart and try to boot into the OS under question and get the BSOD, then again it finds a problem, but unable to solve. Next attempt at startup repair, it finds no problem.

So basically, now it's back to the same stage that it was before, i.e. BSOD.

I shall run SFC again and see what comes, if it's different from previous time, but I think some more creative ideas are needed here. Update: The log file is exactly the same. This is despite it reporting that it repaired some files last time. How can they be repaired twice? Attaching new log, though same.

OK I tried and failed a few more attempts. Refer to my original (rather long... sorry, but wanted to give full info) post:

• I took a snap of the offending BSOD. Contains bugcheck parameters{0xFFFFFFFFC0000034,0x0000000000000002,0x0,0x0}. Maybe it could help :
  Attachment 294488
• Since originally pciidex.sys and msahci.sys were found missing, I tried changing the SATA mode to IDE, then RAID. With IDE, it went a lot slower and failed at the same spot. With RAID, it failed with a 0x00000007 STOP error with no name, as seen here :
  Attachment 294489
• I found this link, which told me to delete bootcat.cache. No difference.

Hope this makes it easier for you guys.

For a 0x7B BSOD, I would suggest you to follow it:
Troubleshooting Windows 7 Failure to Start

Do it from the beginning, from the bootable virus scan, cause 0x7Bs are sometimes caused by some malware called bootkit.

BTW, if you mark C as active and then run startup repair three times, what happens?

Edit: if you change the storage controller mode to anything that was not in use during windows installation, windows will never boot. The only exception is that you can use AHCI later, even if windows is installed in IDE mode; by following this method: AHCI : Enable in Windows 7 / Vista