# total identified windows installations: 0



## ishamm (Jun 21, 2009)

ok so my pc has been acting up... again, this time i litterally have no idea what to do or why it happened.
one day it just shut down and would not startup any more, it goes straight to startup repair and fails and loops this. i have fixed this issue before, with bootrec tools on the 7 CD, but this time it wont do anything, no matter what i try it tells me "total identified windows installations: 0"
does anyone know what to do, other than a fresh install, since i have hundreds of gbs of music and movies not recently backed up, and lots of work on the drive i cannot lose.
thanks

i am using windows 7 64 pro, on a i5 self built machine, on a WD Caviar Green 1tb drive


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## TheOutcaste (Aug 8, 2007)

If the Windows installation has gotten corrupted, the repair process might not be able to see that it's present, the files it looks for may have been damaged.

You can run the System File Checker to see if it can replace any corrupted files.
You can run chkdsk on the drive, see if it can fix any file system errors, and recover data from any sectors that are bad. There is a chance that data can be lost, so you may want to recover the files first.

Boot with the Vista/Win7 DVD, or Repair CD.
Select your *Language*, click *Next*
Click *Repair your Computer*
It will scan for Vista/Win 7 installations, wait for it to finish. (It won't list XP installations).
If using Win7 Disk, select *Use recovery tools that can help fix problems starting Windows.* at the top.
Click *Next*
Note the drive letter shown for the Windows installation, drive letters may be different than what you see in Windows.
Click *Command Prompt*.
We need to determine the drive letters for the Boot drive and the drive that has the Windows folder.
The drive letter of the Windows folder was shown in the preceding screen. This drive letter will be used with the *OffWinDir* switch later
The System Reserved partition (if it exists), which normally doesn't have a drive letter, will have one in the RE.
This drive will contain the Boot folder, but the Boot folder is hidden, so we have to use the Command Prompt to find it.
If used, the System Reserved partition is often assigned the letter C:, and Windows will be on D:
Click *File | Open*.
Click *Computer* in the left Panel.
Note the drive letters shown.
Close Notepad.
For each drive letter shown (Except X: (Boot) and the CDROM) type this command:
*Dir /A C:\B**. Note the letter that has the Boot Directory. This is the letter used with the *OffBootDir* switch.
Type this command, spaces between the difference colors:
*SFC /ScanNow /OffBootDir=C: /OffWinDir=C:\Windows*

To run *chkdsk*, type this command, using the drive letter that the Windows install is on. Might want to run it on the System Reserved partition as well if your system has one
*chkdsk C: /R*

You can use Robocopy from the Command Prompt to copy files to an external drive, basic syntax is *Robocopy "Source" "Destination" /E /R:5 /W:5*, this copies the Source folder and all it's contents to the Destination folder. The */R* and */W* switches set it to try a file 5 times, waiting 5 seconds between tries (the default is 1 million tries, and 30 seconds, don't want to wait 347 days before skipping a bad file)

You can also open two copies of Notepad, and use two Open dialogs as mini explorer windows, and drag and drip between them. One problem is you can't copy hidden or system files this way, as they don't show up.

Or a Linux Live CD can be used to copy files to an external drive, over a network to another PC, or burn them to CD/DVD.
Knoppix
Linux Mint
Puppy Linux
Ubuntu

Here's a guide to using Ubuntu for this:
Use Ubuntu Live CD to Backup Files from Your Dead Windows Computer
Version 10 looks different than the screen shots, you don't get the same boot menu. Just be sure to choose the *Try* option, not the *Install* option when asked.


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