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I'm working on a friend's computer; an HP Pavilion with the recovery OS installed on another partition. The box also has a 7-disk set of recovery disks.I need to do a System File Check, but I know this won't work with the recovery CDs, and I'd rather not reinstall the OS if I don't have to.
I did the run command sfc /scannow and it was accepted. However, before it went too far, I exited the command with no harm done, thinking that the PC would eventually ask for a regular XP disk.
With this type of setup, is there a way to perform a System File Check, or is OS reinstallation the only option? The computer's got some real issues.
Thanks, IronMan
You may have CAB files on your hard drive or files in i386 folder. My Pavilion does, and I have run SFC many times. Thus, you may not need the OS disk. I would try letting SFC run its course, see if it finds anything, and see if it seems to have performed properly without a CD in the drive.
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When you run sfc / scannow, sfc first look into c:\windows\i386 folder. If sfc finds the files in this folder to be corrupted, it will then prompt you to insert native XP CD. In your case, should you ever get to this point, your only recourse would be: use the recovery cd set to reformat and reinstall the OS to the pre-installed factory state.
i_XpUser
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IronMan,
I'm sure you know what you need to do after running sfc /scannow or doing the recovery cd: Turn on the firewall and anti-virus before you go to Windows Update site for the critical updates, etc. If you have the SP2 CD, use it instead.
i_XpUser
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Appreciate the help. I think I'll just start the System File Check, let it run its course, and see what turns up; it certainly couldn't hurt the PC's performance right now. And yes, I knew about the critical updates after doing the SFC.Thanks again.
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You're welcome, IronMan.
By the way, I think a lot of us here are interested to know how the sfc /scannow thing turn out, especially when you don't have native XP CD. Good luck.
i_XpUser
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As salgolf has said, the System File Checker will probably find the CAB files on the Hard Drive. That is where they are on my Dell, and I don't need a CD to run the SFC /scannow operation.
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The rest of the story. . .Before initiating the System File Check, I wanted to try a couple more things in Safe Mode. And that's where everything froze-- right before entering Safe Mode. It's not the HDD; I ran a factory diagnostic on it a few hours ago. There was no other choice than to reinstall the OS from the recovery CDs.
Just as well. As I mentioned, the box had major problems. A sfc /scannow may not have helped anyway. My friend admitted he tweaked the registry "just a bit."
He must have used a power saw. :-|
To those in the forum, thanks again for responding to my original post.
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Thanks for posting back, IronMan.
You wrote There was no other choice than to reinstall the OS from the recovery CDs. Does this means that you would not even be able to do sfc /scannow on a factory-installed OS such as HP?
i_XpUser
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XpUser, had the box not frozen, I believe it probably would have made it all the way through the System File Check. After all, the PC accepted the run command and began examining its files, until I pre-emptively exited the procedure the first time, as I mentioned.When it froze on the reboot, the OS finally bit dust. No F8 for Safe Mode, No F10 for System Recovery, No F1 for BIOS. It forced a cold shutdown, and subsequent cold boots from startup yielded a nothing. It did accept the first recovery disk--good thing!--and I proceeded to reinstall the OS.
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Thanks for that, IronMan. Oh boy isn't this what you get when you have pre-installed OS. Here goes my recommendation to others: Don't ever buy a PC that comes without native XP CD.
i_XpUser
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