[O] reinstalling windows XP troubles
Jennifer & Reinier Sjouw
android phone to my windows XP machine. This required, apparently, the
samsung program kies. So I dutifully downloaded that from samsung.
However, the instalation thereof had my PC Crash. completely. Rebooting
safe mode and subsequent uninstall didn't help.
Eventually I decided to reinstall windows XP. This sort of worked, up to
the point where I installed SP3. There, I got an abundance of error
messages.
mswsock.dll supposedly was not a valid windows image - or so reported
several programs. And the firewall wouldn't start. And the ISC didn't
start either.
Via sfc/scannow I got a valid mswsock, but:
- I didn't get internet access
- I got three windows updates offered to me
- installing the windows updates instantly reinstated the problem of
having the wrong mswsock.dll
I have now reverted to SP2, but that obviously is not a desirable situation.
Is there a bofh here who has a useful suggestion (other than "switch to
Linux", "buy Windows 7" or "Go Apple")?
TTFN,
Reinier
Lionel
> Eventually I decided to reinstall windows XP. This sort of worked, up to
> the point where I installed SP3. There, I got an abundance of error
> messages.
There are multiple ways you can do a 'Doze reinstall. You can scrub the
boot drive completely first, or you can install over the existing copy.
From your description, it sounds like you did the latter, & you have one
or more corrupted DLLs or drivers.
I also wouldn't be surprised if you have some nasty piece of malware in
your system, because that's a common cause of the kind of symptoms you
describe.
Either way, if you're up for some microsurgery, you could reboot to a
command line, go in, & delete the problem file, then reboot to your
install CD & do an in-place reinstall. If you don't think you're up for
doing that, scrub the boot partition & reinstall from scratch.
> Is there a bofh here who has a useful suggestion
You are greatly misunderstanding the BOFH concept, but I'm happy to cut a
fellow Pratchett fan a fair amount of slack. ;^)
> (other than "switch to
> Linux", "buy Windows 7" or "Go Apple")?
After a couple of decades spent fixing idiotic 'Doze problems, I finally
switched permanently over to Linux, late last year. For people who're
very used to Windows, Ubuntu is a very good Linux distro.
--
W
. | , w , "Some people are alive only because
\|/ \|/ it is illegal to kill them." Perna condita delenda est
---^----^---------------------------------------------------------------
Jennifer & Reinier Sjouw
> On Thu, 03 Mar 2011 22:30:06 +0100, Jennifer& Reinier Sjouw wrote:
>
>> Eventually I decided to reinstall windows XP. This sort of worked, up to
>> the point where I installed SP3. There, I got an abundance of error
>> messages.
>
> There are multiple ways you can do a 'Doze reinstall. You can scrub the
> boot drive completely first, or you can install over the existing copy.
> or more corrupted DLLs or drivers.
> I also wouldn't be surprised if you have some nasty piece of malware in
> your system, because that's a common cause of the kind of symptoms you
> describe.
>
> Either way, if you're up for some microsurgery, you could reboot to a
> install CD& do an in-place reinstall. If you don't think you're up for
> doing that, scrub the boot partition& reinstall from scratch.
But as soon as I install SP3, either form windows update, or a
downloaded SP3, or a microsoft SP3 disk, I regain the problm of mswsock.dll
>
>> Is there a bofh here who has a useful suggestion
>
> You are greatly misunderstanding the BOFH concept, but I'm happy to cut a
> fellow Pratchett fan a fair amount of slack. ;^)
>
>> (other than "switch to
>> Linux", "buy Windows 7" or "Go Apple")?
>
> After a couple of decades spent fixing idiotic 'Doze problems, I finally
> switched permanently over to Linux, late last year. For people who're
> very used to Windows, Ubuntu is a very good Linux distro.
>
Ubuntu or several types of debian work nicely. Also on the troublesome
machine, when I run from a live CD. Very suited to making image backups
of the windows system disk. However, this particular machine I' cannot
permanently switch away from windows for the foreseeable future.
Thanks,
Reinier
Lionel
> On 4-3-2011 0:48, Lionel wrote:
>> On Thu, 03 Mar 2011 22:30:06 +0100, Jennifer& Reinier Sjouw wrote:
>>
>>> Eventually I decided to reinstall windows XP. This sort of worked, up
>>> to the point where I installed SP3. There, I got an abundance of error
>>> messages.
>>
>> There are multiple ways you can do a 'Doze reinstall. You can scrub the
>> boot drive completely first, or you can install over the existing copy.
>> From your description, it sounds like you did the latter,& you have
>> one
>> or more corrupted DLLs or drivers.
>> I also wouldn't be surprised if you have some nasty piece of malware in
>> your system, because that's a common cause of the kind of symptoms you
>> describe.
>>
>> Either way, if you're up for some microsurgery, you could reboot to a
>> command line, go in,& delete the problem file, then reboot to your
>> install CD& do an in-place reinstall. If you don't think you're up for
>> doing that, scrub the boot partition& reinstall from scratch.
> Strangely enough, reverting to SP2 seems to resolve the problem. But as
> soon as I install SP3, either form windows update, or a downloaded SP3,
> or a microsoft SP3 disk, I regain the problm of mswsock.dll
FWIW, I also had lots of trouble updating from SP2+patches to SP3, but I
don't think it's related to your problem. Nuke the problematic DLL from
command-line Safe mode, or stick with SP2 + a 3rd party firewall. Either
way, that should keep you up & running safely. (SP3 is mostly fire-wallish
stuff & DRM anyway.)
>> After a couple of decades spent fixing idiotic 'Doze problems, I
>> finally switched permanently over to Linux, late last year. For people
>> who're very used to Windows, Ubuntu is a very good Linux distro.
>>
> Ubuntu or several types of debian work nicely. Also on the troublesome
> machine, when I run from a live CD. Very suited to making image backups
> of the windows system disk. However, this particular machine I' cannot
> permanently switch away from windows for the foreseeable future.
No worries. I needed to keep a current 'Doze install for a bunch of
reasons, so I ran Linux on a second machine. By the time that 'Doze
became too much of a pain to support any more, I was comfortable enough
to switch over to Ubuntu without much pain. (That said, the one 'Doze app
that I really miss is Photoshop, because there is no Linux distro that
supports professional colour management, & I'm a serious photographer -
so I'm still working on that.)
> Thanks,
No problem. As long as you make an effort to fix your problems before
asking for help, I'm happy to give advice.
Jennifer & Reinier Sjouw
> On Sun, 06 Mar 2011 12:07:06 +0100, Jennifer& Reinier Sjouw wrote:
>
>> On 4-3-2011 0:48, Lionel wrote:
>>> On Thu, 03 Mar 2011 22:30:06 +0100, Jennifer& Reinier Sjouw wrote:
>>>
>>>> Eventually I decided to reinstall windows XP. This sort of worked, up
>>>> to the point where I installed SP3. There, I got an abundance of error
>>>> messages.
>>>
>>> There are multiple ways you can do a 'Doze reinstall. You can scrub the
>>> boot drive completely first, or you can install over the existing copy.
>>> From your description, it sounds like you did the latter,& you have
>>> one
>>> or more corrupted DLLs or drivers.
>>> I also wouldn't be surprised if you have some nasty piece of malware in
>>> your system, because that's a common cause of the kind of symptoms you
>>> describe.
>>>
>>> Either way, if you're up for some microsurgery, you could reboot to a
>>> command line, go in,& delete the problem file, then reboot to your
>>> install CD& do an in-place reinstall. If you don't think you're up for
>>> doing that, scrub the boot partition& reinstall from scratch.
>> Strangely enough, reverting to SP2 seems to resolve the problem. But as
>> soon as I install SP3, either form windows update, or a downloaded SP3,
>> or a microsoft SP3 disk, I regain the problm of mswsock.dll
>
> FWIW, I also had lots of trouble updating from SP2+patches to SP3, but I
> don't think it's related to your problem. Nuke the problematic DLL from
> command-line Safe mode, or stick with SP2 + a 3rd party firewall. Either
> stuff& DRM anyway.)
>
>>> After a couple of decades spent fixing idiotic 'Doze problems, I
>>> finally switched permanently over to Linux, late last year. For people
>>> who're very used to Windows, Ubuntu is a very good Linux distro.
>>>
>> Ubuntu or several types of debian work nicely. Also on the troublesome
>> machine, when I run from a live CD. Very suited to making image backups
>> of the windows system disk. However, this particular machine I' cannot
>> permanently switch away from windows for the foreseeable future.
>
> No worries. I needed to keep a current 'Doze install for a bunch of
> reasons, so I ran Linux on a second machine. By the time that 'Doze
> became too much of a pain to support any more, I was comfortable enough
> to switch over to Ubuntu without much pain. (That said, the one 'Doze app
> that I really miss is Photoshop, because there is no Linux distro that
> so I'm still working on that.)
>
>> Thanks,
>
> No problem. As long as you make an effort to fix your problems before
> asking for help, I'm happy to give advice.
>
repair installation of XP requires the (hidden) installations of IE7 and
IE8 have to be removed via the recovery console. So, did that, repair
installed again, and we seem to be in (XP SP3) business.
Still photoshopping!
Still doing updates though.
TTFN,
Reinier