'Startup Repair' on Win7 - how long does it take?

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  1. Posts : 10
    windows 7 home premium 32
       #1

    'Startup Repair' on Win7 - how long does it take?


    Hello all,

    My desktop (Medion Akoya, i3 processor) running Win 7 Home Premium refused to go any further after getting to the login stage ( it accepts the password but after that, the screen goes black), so I attempted the 'Startup Repair' option on the Recovery disk.
    I'm now at the point where the system is attempting to repair disk errors, but this has been running for over 14 hours now and shows no sign of going past this point. I tried clicking on the 'Cancel' button, but all I get is a message saying "the current repair option cannot be cancelled"

    The HD is fairy large at 1TB but only 30gb of this has data on it. So, my question is : will the system eventually finish checking for disk errors and move on to the next stage of the repair, or does it sound like something is stuck and I need to power off/power on?

    This is my first time trying to repair a Win 7 install and also my first attempt with a disk of this size. Is there anything else I can do - or should I sit on my hands for a while and leave Win 7 to get on with its job?
      My Computer

  2.    #2

    Wait for someone to answer who knows for certain.
      My Computer


  3. Posts : 31,242
    Windows 11 Pro x64 [Latest Release and Release Preview]
       #3

    This is a question without a definitive answer, The disk repair stage can take a long time on a large disk, I am old enough to remember when this used to take anything up to an hour a MB,with the then standard 20MB drive taking all day to check/fix.

    Luckily that does not apply now but for a 1TB drive with serious issues I would not be surprised that it would take a long time, 24 hours or even more. the test and repair is for the whole disk not just the data, which is covered by other tests, prior to the sector by sector disk repair

    The issue here is how effective is this repair going to be? maybe after 24 hours the repair will fail? It may be that if the data is backed up and safe and you have the time to work interactively with the system It may be more efficient to bite the bullet, and re-install fresh after a full format of the drive (partitioning the drive to OS plus other would also be beneficial IMO), would be more time effective

    Only you can make this call, of course
      My Computers


  4. Posts : 10
    windows 7 home premium 32
    Thread Starter
       #4

    I realise it's a bit of a 'how long is a piece of string' question; what I should have asked perhaps is : "does anyone have experience of using Windows 7 Startup Repair on a large HD and if so, how long did it take"?
      My Computer


  5. Posts : 31,242
    Windows 11 Pro x64 [Latest Release and Release Preview]
       #5

    Not personally

    I have done a few startup repairs which were all completed quickly, minutes, rather than hours, but none of them actually went to the disk checking stage being just MBR or file issues
      My Computers


  6. Posts : 176
    Win 7 Ult 64-bit
       #6

    You should better do a clean install. It takes only 20 min for installation of the OS and another couple of hours for installing the software. I remember I also tried to do a Startup repair , but after 4 hours I quit . Don't lose Your time.
      My Computer


  7. Posts : 10
    windows 7 home premium 32
    Thread Starter
       #7

    BisVal said:
    You should better do a clean install. It takes only 20 min for installation of the OS and another couple of hours for installing the software. I remember I also tried to do a Startup repair , but after 4 hours I quit . Don't lose Your time.
    Trouble is, I've got a lot of data on the disk which I'm not sure has backed up. The disk seems to be partitioned with d: being the boot partition and c: being everything else. If I re-install Win 7, will it wipe the whole disk clean?
      My Computer

  8.    #8

    If Win7 won't start you can try copying your data out using the DVD Repair console or Repair CD: Copy & Paste - in Windows Recovery Console

    If this fails or you can't see any data, the partition and data may have been destroyed, but you can try one more thing: Rescue Kit Free Edition | PARAGON Software Group - free partition software, hard disk partitioning

    This is why it is best to always keep your files backed up externally.
      My Computer


  9. Posts : 176
    Win 7 Ult 64-bit
       #9

    After clear install only the data on installation partition will be lost
      My Computer

  10.    #10

    What happened?
      My Computer


 
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