re: Recovered WinXP on very small FAT32 partition
Monday, August 25, 2008 at 8:27 am
Windows XP Annoyances Discussion Forum
Posted by Lorna
(11 messages posted)
Thanks for all the info, it does explain quite a lot that was a mystery to me. I
just have one Advent recovery CD-rom that came with the PC. When you boot with it
in the drive, it just has three choices: 'Recover without file destruction,' 'Recover,
no format' and 'Recover, quick format.' As the first two didn't work I used the
last which told me it would install a new operating system and all existing files
would be destroyed. There is no dialogue that allows me to choose a partition for
install. My friend Elaine told me that it automatically installs on the first partition
which is 'RECOVERY'. Could it be that the files were so corrupted on this partition
that the recovery software didn't know what it was? Otherwise it's quite a serious
malfunction! I will attempt anything now to try and fix it as I think all the files
I had are gone now so there's not much to lose. I never usually 'back up' but a
couple of days before I started having the trouble, I backed up all 'My Documents'
and 'My Pictures' to DVD. I was annoyed at how long it took but am I glad I did
it now! Losing everything would have been a hard lesson to learn! and I'll never
be lax about it again. I thought about taking the drive out and reformatting it
in another PC, do you think that's a good idea!!? once again, thanks for all the
help, Lorna
On Sunday, August 24, 2008 at 8:37 am, Richard Harris wrote:
>Normally product activation on a pre-built PC is tied to the BIOS. Thus, so long
>as you do not update the BIOS, or change motherboards, re-installation should cause
>re-activation.
>
>As for the recovery partition, that has little/no value, if you have a true recovery
>CD/DVD. By this I mean a CD/CD-set/DVD that contains an image of the system partition.
> CAUTION: Usually such an image is too big to fit on one CD, even if it excludes
>such files as pagefile.sys and hyberfil.sys, which XP will re-create upon booting.
> The alternative to a true recovery CD is a CD that only contains recovery software
>and acts upon an image of the system partition that is somewhere else, usually on
>a hidden partition, such as the one you have now overwritten.
>
>CAUTION: If you do not have a true recovery CD/CD-set/DVD, do NOT attempt the following
>!
>
>Given where you are, I would delete all partitions, create a few new ones (at least
>two), then let the recovery CD install XP on the first partition. The reason for
>at least two paritions is to allow you store personal files on the second partition.
> Then, if you ever need to re-install XP, your persoanl file will not be destroyed
>as part of that process.
>
>As for FAT32 vs NTFS, I have used both under XP and have found no advantage to NTFS,
>unless I am dealing with single files larger than 4 Gig. Then, NTFS is required.
> NTFS can be made more secure than FAT32, but true security involves physically
guarding
>the PC more than fancy software. NTFS is suposed to be more reliable and/or self-healing
>(via CHKDSK), but in practice I have had as many problems with NTFS partitions as
>with FAT32 partitions. FAT32 is easier to read/write outside of XP, in cases where
>XP won't boot even into safe mode.
>
>With respect to the future, get some reliable (non-Microsoft) backup/restore software
>and do occassional backups of the operating system partition to somewhere off of
>the PC, such as an external USB disk, CDs/DVDs, etc. I use Acronis TrueImage, but
>the latest Norton GHOST has similar capabilities to restore from outside of XP and
>from external USB drives. Other options, some free, can be found at:
>
>http://www.majorgeeks.com/downloads3.html
>
>
>
>
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 | | | |  | re: Recovered WinXP on very small FAT32 partition (Lorna: Mon, Aug 25, 2008, 8:27 am) |
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