Hi Everyone,
I took the time to read and skim through all 9 pages of the postings on this thread and found that my error is somewhat unique to what everyone else is experiencing.
I'm running WIN2K. I'm not sure if it's Pro or not. Does it matter? I know it's not server or workstation. Anyway, I hadn't had the computer online since May, and just recently put it back online and almost immediately got a virus before i could even update my virus files and download windows security updates. It would freeze after i entered my login and password into windows. I got around it by just changing the password. I tried running the virus scan and it would freeze when scanning this particular directory. I don't remember which it was, but i seem to think it was in the system32 folder somewhere. So i just ran the virus check on every other directory, and it found nothing, but continued ot lock up if i went to a full system scan. So i took my computer back off the internet and now about 2 weeks later of little to no trouble with it, i ran into another problem:
Out of nowhere, my computer locked up in windows and i rebooted and now get the error everyone here's been talking about:
Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:
<Windows 2000 root>\system32\ntoskrnl.exe.
Please reinstall a copy of the above file.
I don't have a windows 2K CD readily available, (though i can have my brother mail me his) so i downloaded off a website the 4 floppy boot disks so that i could at least run setup of windows.
This is the link I got the boot disks from:
http://www.bootdisk.com/bootdisk.htm
From there, i tried JrzyCrim's instructions for Recovery Console, but ran into a problem.
I followed the instructions at the following link:
http://www.windowsnetworking.com/j_helmig/wxprcons.htm
But at the final blue screen, when i hit C to enter recovery console, instead of it asking me which windows 2000 installation i would like to login to, and then asking for the administrator password, it just takes me to a command prompt directly. The prompt it takes me to is C:>, not C:\WINNT>.
I type DIR, and see the directory WINNT. I type "cd WINNT" and i get
"The system cannot find the file or directory specified"
I try JrzyCrim's code: "cd c:\winnt\system32", it says
"The system cannot find the file or directory specified"
When i try: cd "c:\winnt\driver cache\i386", i get the same thing.
But when i type "cd NVIDIA", (another directory I see in C:) it says "Access Denied", which i think it should.
So then i tried a repair installation, thinking it wouldn't be a big deal to lose the windows updates, etc. So i made a ERD from my dad's laptop which runs WIN2K Pro. I don't know if any other aspect of windows is the same, other than they're both 2K. And i tried a fast repair and a manual repair using the ERD and without using the ERD. (so 4 different tries). The steps i followed were at this link:
http://www.windows2000.windowsreinstall.com/
Each try ended with the same result. After i inserted the ERD, and pressed enter, or after i said i did not have an ERD, instead of saying it found windows 2000 in the following folder, it said
Setup cannot create the folder
\WINNT
Setup cannot continue until the folder is created
Press To Retry, Press ENTER
To quit Setup, Press F3
When i press enter, it does nothing, and i have to restart the setup, which takes me right back to where i started.
So it seems not to be seeing the entire directory WINNT. Do i need the actual Windows 2K CD to do a repair installation? Because as stated, I'm just using 4 floppy boot disks to get into windows setup.
I'm quite lost on what to do. Any help would be appreciated. And thank you in advance for your time and effort.
~Rick
Hello,
If you do a repair installation of Windows (XP?), you won't have to re-install any of your apps. However, you will have to install all of your windows hotfixes and updates. You shouldn't have to do a repair install, however.
You can use the Recovery Console on your Windows CD .
Just follow the instructions at the above link.
Once at the command prompt, type in the following commands:
Edited:
cd c:\windows\system32
copy "..\driver cache\i386\ntoskrnl.exe"
If prompted to overwite the existing file, type y and enter.
If you receive a file not found error, make sure that the path in the copy command is correct. If it is correct and you still receive the error, then try the following commands:
cd "c:\windows\driver cache\i386"
expand sp1.cab -F:ntoskrnl.exe c:\windows\system32
Again, if you are prompted to overwrite the file, type y and then enter.
Also, if your OS is installed on a partition/drive other than C:, then replace any occurance of C: with the correct letter. (D: for example).
Replace any occurence of 'windows' with what is appropriate for your system. (winnt for example)
Reboot. Your system should start up normally.