replaced 'system' file.... oops??

jamesleecoleman

Alright so I was working on a laptop that was having problems.
The first problem was the ntoskrnl. It was missing or corrupted.
The file was there so I guess it was corrupted so I replaced it
from the dell cd. I rebooted and that problem went away.
The next problem was the hal.dll file. Same message, different
file. Same steps repeated, it went away.

Then on to the 'system' file. I remembered seeing from the AIO book
this file. So I tried to replace it and I couldn't remember were the file
was on the cd, it turns out that the cd has three files with the name
'system' I didn't know which one and all three had file extension and
the 'system' file didn't. So I checked out the AIO book to see where the backup
'system' file was. I found it and replaced the bad 'system' file with the one
from the repair folder. I rebooted and oops?? Windows started to boot and
then check disk screen cameup (the one that comes up right before windows
login screen). It told me that it couldn't find autocheck disk and then it went
right into the blue screen giving me an error code. I didn't write down the error
code. I tried to reboot twice but I got the same results. Does anyone have
an idea of what happened? I'm really confused because I thought it would
have worked. I found it odd that all these files were messed up. Virus maybe?
What end up happening is a reinstall of windows, if I can't figure this out by tomorrow.
I'd rather not that happen because people will have to reinstall everything all over again.

dynamik

Sounds like you overwrote the registry...

tiersten

Time to reinstall. ntoskrnl and the HAL shouldn't be corrupted in the first place...

undomiel

When those errors come up the best thing to do first is grab your XP cd and boot into the recovery console. Run a chkdsk /p and see if it reports unrecoverable errors. If it does then most likely it is time to replace that drive. If not then run chkdsk /r and most times that will get you running again.

RobertKaucher

This sounds like either a bad drive or a very bad piece of malware. All I can say is that the safest is probaly going to be a reinstall either way...

jamesleecoleman

I was thinking I did something to the registry at first but I honestly wasn't sure. The people were going to reinstall anyways but I wanted to save the computer. I'll make sure to try out the chkdsk later on when I go back today. Thanks for the input everyone!

dynamik

You literally overwrote your registry. You can't repair it at this point if you don't have a backup.