Solved Another infinite boot loop

[HenryMitchel]

Hi
I had a virus, downloaded some subpar anti virus (Yet Another Cleaner) and it deleted the virus... along with some Windows registry or something important along those lines. My computer is now stuck in an infinite boot loop.
Undoed a System Restore to a point before the anti virus killed my comp (earlier I tried system restore to get rid of the virus) but it's still stuck. I'm guessing restoring to an earlier point won't help.
Just finished with http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/139576-startup-repair-infinite-loop-recovery.html once but it's still stuck.
I think I have allowed System Repair to attempt to fix my system 3 times to no avail.
Last known good configuration does not do anything.
I think these are the chronological order of events.
I'd like to get out of the loop without loss of data (obviously...) and I don't think i have the win 7 disk on me (might ask someone if they have one but doubtful), I can get my hands on another computer but i'd like to avoid that if possible.
Thanks in advance if anyone can help.

 

[paul1149]

Worst case you should be able to rescue data via another computer. But before you do that, I would try manually rebuilding the BCD. See Use Bootrec.exe in the Windows RE to troubleshoot startup issues. The three important commands are fixmbr, fixboot, and rebuildbcd. Not sure if you can do this via onboard Repair Computer boot, but I think so. If not, a Repair (or Install) Disk is needed.

 

[gentlebath]

I posted here a while ago on the Blue Screen after a Windows Update and was able to boot up again using the Instructions Here for the Infinite Start-up Loop. I luckily had a recovery disc and used to to run the System Repair.

It ran for almost 8 hours and my laptop opened up to the exact tabs that I had left on it prior to the Update and blue screen. Did you let the repair run long enough to know it did not work? I would have sworn mine was not working until I came up later and my computer was fixed.

Did you ever make a recovery disc? Try running and repairing with that if not I think you can download something like it?? Maybe.

 

[HenryMitchel]

Oh man, thanks guys, no I have not ever made a recovery disk on my comp.
I always left system repair on until it told me it was finished. Unfortunately being unable to fix my problems.

Also I'd rather avoid the BCD for now as I've read it could mess with your data. Guess I'll have to buy a hard drive today to salvage what I can first. Although if I'm doing that, wonder if i should just restore to factory default.

 

[paul1149]

A Factory Reset in Win 7 WILL overwrite your data. The BCD should have nothing to do with your data. Of course, it's always best policy to back up data before doing anything, but I fail to see any connection between the BCD and user data, which can be rescued offline.

 

[HenryMitchel]

I was going by this:
http://www.sevenforums.com/general-discussion/17521-how-fix-mbr-through-command-prompt.html
(bottom post on first page)
" Just a little warning to those who may not know....

Playing with the MBR is a risky thing.
If you don't know how to recover data and haven't done/or don't know how to do a backup.
Then you shouldn't be messing with the MBR at all.

Simply running /fixmbr can and has corrupted it for me several times in the past.
This is not something that a simple windows repair can usually fix, usually. "

Well with all the scans I've been doing it might be a bit late, but they didn't have warnings like this one.

 

[HenryMitchel]

Well after hours and days of trying random cmds and about failed 6 attempts at trying to back up my data, you were right /fixboot fixed the problem (right after a fixmbr so idk if it was one or both)... in about 2 seconds.
And yay the virus seems to be gone too and I have yet to see any loss in data (it's only been on for about 10 seconds tho).

 

[paul1149]

I honestly don't know why automatic Windows repair doesn't do those commands. Now I would scan the machine with MBAM.