Can't boot into Windows after power failure...

what brusse01 said is exactly right.

1. Start Windows 7, and log on to an administrator account.

2. Disable any 3rd party firewall, antivirus, or other security program to avoid it from possibly preventing the repair upgrade installation of Windows 7.

3. Place your Windows 7 installation DVD into the DVD drive and click on the Run setup.exe option in the AutoPlay window from within the currently installed Windows 7. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: If the AutoPlay window does not open, then open the drive folder in Computer and run the setup.exe file.

4. Click on the Install Now button to start the installation. (See screenshot below)

5. Uncheck the I want to help make Windows installation better box (unless you want to), and click on the Go online to get the latest updates for installation option. (See screenshot below)

6. Windows 7 will now check online for and install any available installation updates. (See screenshots below)

7. Check the I accept the license terms box and click on Next. (See screenshot below)

8. Click on the Upgrade option. (See screenshot below)

9. The installation of Windows 7 Beta will now begin. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: During the installation process, your screen may flash and computer will restart a few times.

10. After the final restart, you will see this screen for a moment. (See screenshot below)

11. Type in your Windows 7 product key number. (See screenshot below step 12)

12. Uncheck the Automatically activate Windows when I'm online box unchecked, then click on the Next button. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: You can activate Windows 7 later after you make sure it is running properly. (See step 19 below)
If you chose to automatically activate Windows online when you set up your computer, automatic activation begins trying to activate your copy of Windows three days after you log on for the first time.

13. Click on Use recommended settings. (See screenshot below)

14. Select your time zone and set your time and date settings, then click on the Next button. (See screenshot below)

15. Click on the option for your computer's location to select the correct network location type settings to be applied for that location. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: It is best to select Public location for the best security.

16. Windows 7 will now prepare your desktop to startup. (See screenshots below)

17. Check to see if you are missing any user files. If you are, then you can copy them from the hidden protected operating system C:\$INPLACE.~TR and C:\WINDOWS.~Q folders. (See screenshot below)

18. Run Disk Cleanup (step 6 at this link).You will need to click on the Clean up system files button first, and then check the Files discarded by Windows upgrade box. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: This will delete the C:\$INPLACE.~TR and C:\WINDOWS.~Q folders from step 17 above.

19. Refresh your Windows Experience Index (WEI) score.

20. When done, all you will need to do is to activate Windows 7.

pictures speak a thousand words :-) thanks Olg207... good work

Are we talking about repairing a computer from within Windows 7 when it doesnt boot?
Doug can you boot into Windows?

Hi,

I would like to thank eyeryone who has responded so far.

NO, the computer will not boot. It will not boot in safe mode, safe mode with dos prompt, or any of the other modes. This is using the F8 key. The system will boot from the dvd install disk, however when I try to to an install or "repair install", RC 1 reverts to the installed Windows and requires a boot from the hard disk, and this it will not do.

Lately, I have been trying to do a system restore from the dvd install disk. But I can't get it to find the image on my external hard drive. It's an usb drive. I actually used RC1 to create the image.

The error message I get says "Corrupt Registry". Perhaps I can repair the registry some how. But it will have to be a solution that has its own boot disk.

Doug

Sorry for not posting this sooner, but I eventually did solve the problem.

Using the repair option from the windows DVD, I got into the repair console and typed this command into command prompt "bcdedit /set {default} recoveryenabled No". This disabled startup repair from booting every time I tried to start my PC. This then let me boot far enough to get an error message.

The error message told me which file was corrupt and its exact location. I was lucky enough to find the exact file for download after googling the filename. After I got the file on a flash drive, I went back into command prompt and copied the new, uncorrupted file into the folder it was supposed to be in.

This finally let me back into Windows, but most of the OS was still messed up. From windows, I just did a repair install using the windows upgrade option which put me back to normal. I ran /sfc scannow just to fix any other corruptions and I was finally back into windows without losing anything or having to reformat. Hope this helps anyone else suffering from the same problem.

Glad to hear you did solve the problem. What drive and directory did you enter this command? When I asked for the Command Prompt it takes me to X:\sources and it doesn't run there. I tried c:\windows and it didn't run there either.

I was able to run regedit however. Since my error message refers to "corrupt registry", I wonder if I should start looking at this venue as a solution. Any regedit mavens out there?

I ran the command under C: which is where my windows installation is. So I just typed "C:" to change to C and then I ran the command. I didn't go into any subfolders or anything.

The only registry repair program i like is called CCleaner and I don't think you can run it from the command line so maybe if you can somehow get back into windows give that a try.

I've just experienced the same problem. Power failure during sleep mode. Windows 7 will not boot. Repair will not work. I reloaded Window 7 RTM from scratch and restarted the install.

This sounds like a bug in Windows 7.

Keep in mind sleep mode functions by keeping data in the system RAM but turning off the rest of the computer... with a power failure, the data in your RAM is lost and you won't be able to resume. The computer should still be able to recover or be repairable from the install disc, but its not going to be a guarantee.

If you want more protection use Hibernate, which writes the RAM contents to disk and turns off the RAM. It's slower because the computer must read several GB's of RAM data back into memory from of the hard drive, but a hard drive isn't going to lose the data if the computer loses power.

Still this is why it's best to either use Hibernate or simply have the system shut down completely. Windows 7's "Hybrid sleep" mode is supposed to do both, leave the RAM active AND write the RAM contents to the disk as a backup. But if Hybrid sleep is disabled then the user is taking that risk should the computer lose power.

Hello everyone,

Just thought I'd mention that I managed to fix this particular issue -- kind of. My server running Windows Server 2008 R2 Datacenter x64 had this problem after rebooting. Infinitely it would go into startup repair claiming Corrupt File.

Startup repair claimed there was nothing to fix
Tried all of the fixes before hand that bprrccllo had tried too

SFC also won't do anything about it because it claims there is an installation already pending, and the upgrade option is unavailable on the DVD until I manage to start Windows up again.

As I was not getting any message about which driver was missing, I switched off the recovery with bcdedit to discover which file was causing the problem -- turned out it was "acpi.sys". Hold the phones there though, people reading this for a possible fix ...

My desktop computer is running Windows 7 Professional x64 so it's the same kernel, same compatible drivers too. Copied acpi.sys from there to a USB flash memory stick, then went into the recovery command prompt to put it back. Then discovered msisadrv.sys was missing, pci.sys, vdrvroot.sys, and then plenty more. In the end I copied all the SYS files from the Drivers folder on my desktop computer to the broken server. I was surprised with the amount of drivers that it didn't prompt about overwriting!

Having done this I booted up to find the progress bar now appears. However just before the graphical interface comes up for the login screen, a stop message appears:

0x0000006B: PROCESS1_INITIALIZATION_FAILED
The 4 memory references are all 0x0.

Safe mode is the same, right after the last driver "classpnp.sys". Not quite sure how I will be fixing this, but I'll keep posted as someone else may find it helpful. Going to try copying catroot {F750E6C3-38EE-11D1-85E5-00C04FC295EE} from my desktop to server, as "bootcat.cache" did not exist in my CodeIntegrity folder already to delete.

Edit: Having done this the blue screen no longer happens, it just reboots instead. Looks like there is a LOT more missing than I thought.

Edit 2: Got this completely fixed. Went back to my desktop and put the "catroot", "catroot2", and "drivers" folder in a ZIP. Booted my portable Ubuntu to extract it on to the server disk, and Windows starts up first time. All my software is still here, though I have to re-install a lot of my drivers. No problem that though Running SFC from inside Windows now too.

I hope this helps someone else, as I understand not wanting to format your disk. Thanks for the tips too.