Windows stuck in recovery on dual boot

**PaulPreston** · December 19th, 2010

Hello

I am familiar with Linux servers at work so I fancied ubuntu on my Samsung X120 laptop as a dual boot.

I had to partition disks and grub comes up and gives me a choice of boot. Ubuntu works fine.

Trouble is when I choose the Windows7 option it says windows started, gives me the windows 4 colour flag and then goes into recovery mode 4 and complains about X:\WinClon\Manager1.exe can't be found.

I never had an X drive. If I grep for Manager1.exe it is there on the Windows partition. So I am wondering if the partitioning has messed up the Windows partition for boot.

Any ideas?

Paul

**fatal_ERROR777** · December 19th, 2010

Have you installed ubuntu using wubi? If you did, have you deleted the wubi.exe file? If you did, this is your problem. Try to boot windows in safe mode and install wubi again.

**theasprint** · December 19th, 2010

Just to let you know, the X drive in Windows recovery is the Recovery Drive.

For basic recovery procedures, people used to copy and replace the corrupted or lost files in their C: drive from the X: drive. The X: drive should have at least something similar like your C:\Windows folder.

I think if you grep Manager1.exe, it will show up as C:\WinClon\Manager1.exe. Perhaps to solve the problem, try and run this command:

Code:

copy C:\WinClon\Manager1.exe X:\WinClon\Manager1.exe

Its quite ironic to recover the recovery partition. Hope it works.

And did you do something wrong during your partitioning? Like partially taking away your X (recovery drive)?

Good Luck

**sikander3786** · December 19th, 2010

In order to let us take a look at your setup/drives/boot and diagnose the problem, you need to post the output of bootinfoscript as per instructions here.

http://bootinfoscript.sourceforge.net

While posting, click the # icon in post menu and paste your text in between the generated code tags.

Thanks.

**PaulPreston** · December 19th, 2010

Ok here is the results.txt

Code:

                Boot Info Script 0.55    dated February 15th, 2010                    

============================= Boot Info Summary: ==============================

 => Grub 2 is installed in the MBR of /dev/sda and looks on the same drive in 
    partition #3 for (,msdos3)/boot/grub.

sda1: _________________________________________________________________________

    File system:       
    Boot sector type:  -
    Boot sector info:  
    Mounting failed:
mount: unknown filesystem type ''

sda2: _________________________________________________________________________

    File system:       ntfs
    Boot sector type:  Windows Vista/7
    Boot sector info:  No errors found in the Boot Parameter Block.
    Operating System:  
    Boot files/dirs:   /bootmgr /boot/bcd

sda3: _________________________________________________________________________

    File system:       ext2
    Boot sector type:  -
    Boot sector info:  
    Operating System:  Ubuntu 10.10
    Boot files/dirs:   /boot/grub/grub.cfg /etc/fstab /boot/grub/core.img

sda4: _________________________________________________________________________

    File system:       ntfs
    Boot sector type:  Windows Vista/7
    Boot sector info:  No errors found in the Boot Parameter Block.
    Operating System:  Windows 7
    Boot files/dirs:   /Windows/System32/winload.exe /wubildr.mbr 
                       /ubuntu/winboot/wubildr.mbr /wubildr 
                       /ubuntu/winboot/wubildr

=========================== Drive/Partition Info: =============================

Drive: sda ___________________ _____________________________________________________

Disk /dev/sda: 250.1 GB, 250059350016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 30401 cylinders, total 488397168 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

Partition  Boot         Start           End          Size  Id System

/dev/sda1                  63         2,047         1,985  42 SFS
/dev/sda2               2,048    31,459,327    31,457,280  27 Hidden HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda3    *    369,655,650   486,843,149   117,187,500  83 Linux
/dev/sda4          31,664,128   369,641,471   337,977,344  42 SFS


blkid -c /dev/null: ____________________________________________________________

Device           UUID                                   TYPE       LABEL                         

/dev/sda2        CE26BADE26BAC6AD                       ntfs       RECOVERY                      
/dev/sda3        27584650-9210-4f81-a1f2-380526e88815   ext2                                     
/dev/sda4        CE2EB81D2EB7FC91                       ntfs                                     
/dev/sda: PTTYPE="dos" 

============================ "mount | grep ^/dev  output: ===========================

Device           Mount_Point              Type       Options

/dev/sda3        /                        ext2       (rw,errors=remount-ro)


=========================== sda3/boot/grub/grub.cfg: ===========================

#
# DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE
#
# It is automatically generated by grub-mkconfig using templates
# from /etc/grub.d and settings from /etc/default/grub
#

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/00_header ###
if [ -s $prefix/grubenv ]; then
  set have_grubenv=true
  load_env
fi
set default="0"
if [ "${prev_saved_entry}" ]; then
  set saved_entry="${prev_saved_entry}"
  save_env saved_entry
  set prev_saved_entry=
  save_env prev_saved_entry
  set boot_once=true
fi

function savedefault {
  if [ -z "${boot_once}" ]; then
    saved_entry="${chosen}"
    save_env saved_entry
  fi
}

function recordfail {
  set recordfail=1
  if [ -n "${have_grubenv}" ]; then if [ -z "${boot_once}" ]; then save_env recordfail; fi; fi
}

function load_video {
  insmod vbe
  insmod vga
}

insmod part_msdos
insmod ext2
set root='(hd0,msdos3)'
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 27584650-9210-4f81-a1f2-380526e88815
if loadfont /usr/share/grub/unicode.pf2 ; then
  set gfxmode=640x480
  load_video
  insmod gfxterm
fi
terminal_output gfxterm
insmod part_msdos
insmod ext2
set root='(hd0,msdos3)'
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 27584650-9210-4f81-a1f2-380526e88815
set locale_dir=($root)/boot/grub/locale
set lang=en
insmod gettext
if [ "${recordfail}" = 1 ]; then
  set timeout=-1
else
  set timeout=10
fi
### END /etc/grub.d/00_header ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/05_debian_theme ###
set menu_color_normal=white/black
set menu_color_highlight=black/light-gray
### END /etc/grub.d/05_debian_theme ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###
menuentry 'Ubuntu, with Linux 2.6.35-22-generic' --class ubuntu --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os {
    recordfail
    insmod part_msdos
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd0,msdos3)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 27584650-9210-4f81-a1f2-380526e88815
    linux    /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.35-22-generic root=/dev/sda3 ro   quiet splash
    initrd    /boot/initrd.img-2.6.35-22-generic
}
menuentry 'Ubuntu, with Linux 2.6.35-22-generic (recovery mode)' --class ubuntu --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os {
    recordfail
    insmod part_msdos
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd0,msdos3)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 27584650-9210-4f81-a1f2-380526e88815
    echo    'Loading Linux 2.6.35-22-generic ...'
    linux    /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.35-22-generic root=/dev/sda3 ro single 
    echo    'Loading initial ramdisk ...'
    initrd    /boot/initrd.img-2.6.35-22-generic
}
### END /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/20_linux_xen ###
### END /etc/grub.d/20_linux_xen ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/20_memtest86+ ###
menuentry "Memory test (memtest86+)" {
    insmod part_msdos
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd0,msdos3)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 27584650-9210-4f81-a1f2-380526e88815
    linux16    /boot/memtest86+.bin
}
menuentry "Memory test (memtest86+, serial console 115200)" {
    insmod part_msdos
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd0,msdos3)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 27584650-9210-4f81-a1f2-380526e88815
    linux16    /boot/memtest86+.bin console=ttyS0,115200n8
}
### END /etc/grub.d/20_memtest86+ ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/30_os-prober ###
menuentry "Windows Vista (loader) (on /dev/sda2)" {
    insmod part_msdos
    insmod ntfs
    set root='(hd0,msdos2)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set ce26bade26bac6ad
    chainloader +1
}
### END /etc/grub.d/30_os-prober ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/40_custom ###
# This file provides an easy way to add custom menu entries.  Simply type the
# menu entries you want to add after this comment.  Be careful not to change
# the 'exec tail' line above.
### END /etc/grub.d/40_custom ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/41_custom ###
if [ -f  $prefix/custom.cfg ]; then
  source $prefix/custom.cfg;
fi
### END /etc/grub.d/41_custom ###

=============================== sda3/etc/fstab: ===============================

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid -o value -s UUID' to print the universally unique identifier
# for a device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name
# devices that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>
proc            /proc           proc    nodev,noexec,nosuid 0       0
# / was on /dev/sda3 during installation
UUID=27584650-9210-4f81-a1f2-380526e88815 /               ext2    errors=remount-ro 0       1
/dev/scd0       /media/floppy0  auto    rw,user,noauto,exec,utf8 0       0

=================== sda3: Location of files loaded by Grub: ===================


 208.9GB: boot/grub/core.img
 209.0GB: boot/grub/grub.cfg
 208.9GB: boot/initrd.img-2.6.35-22-generic
 208.9GB: boot/vmlinuz-2.6.35-22-generic
 208.9GB: initrd.img
 208.9GB: vmlinuz

**PaulPreston** · December 19th, 2010

Hi

thanks for the advice about copy. I suspect you are correct, I may have ruined whatever was the X partition. The copy command you posted is DOS comman - how do I get to DOS to issue that copy command?

Thanks to all for help.

Paul

**sikander3786** · December 19th, 2010

You've also got a Wubi install on your Windows partition. Do you want to recover that as well? If not, follow the procedure below. If yes, post back and don't follow.

The easiest solution here is to boot Windows 7 install or repair disc and perform startup repair 3 times at least. Yes, 3 times. If you don't have a Windows 7 disc, grab one here (not pirated).

http://neosmart.net/blog/2009/window...-repair-discs/

Once you are able to boot Windows successfully, you need to re-install Grub2. Boot an Ubuntu Live CD and from Applications > Accessories > Terminal,

Code:

sudo mount /dev/sda3 /mnt

Code:

sudo grub-install --root-directory=/mnt/ /dev/sda

Note, for the second command, it is just sda without an integer and not sda3

Reboot and boot Ubuntu. If Windows was not listed, from Ubuntu booted from HDD,

Code:

sudo update-grub

**PaulPreston** · December 19th, 2010

Thanks that's really helpful, what you suggest makes good sense. I am not worried about wubi so I am downloading the repair disk. I am hoping it will detect it and boot from the repair disk - I am not sure what the key sequence is to make it boot from CD and grub is the first thing it shows now.

I will let you know if this succeeds, I will try later when the download is done and I manage to get a disk burnt.

Paul

**PaulPreston** · December 20th, 2010

Update is:

after doing a bios edit so it would boot from the CD the recovery disk prompts for drivers so it can read the hard drive - I do't have a separate disk with these drivers. I then decided that as I can see all my files that GRUB may not be seeing the correct partition so I copied then edited grub.cfg which then gave me the option to boot Windows 7 in choice of 2 partitions. In either case one becomes X and the other C but all avenues lead to it telling me it can't recover.

I think I must have messed up a partition and I feel I am so close. I have copied all my documents on the windows partition to a flash drive so I am good to get Win7 reinstalled and try it all again.

Thanks for suggestions, they were all good, shame have not succeeded. I am going to leave it for a while but pleased to receive suggestions if there are any bright ideas.

Paul

**sikander3786** · December 20th, 2010

after doing a bios edit so it would boot from the CD the recovery disk prompts for drivers so it can read the hard drive -

In my opinion, that is happening because of this.

sda1: __________________________________________________ _______________________

File system:
Boot sector type: -
Boot sector info:
Mounting failed:
mount: unknown filesystem type ''

What was there on sda1? Some sort of Utility partition I believe. If that was nothing important there, just deleting the partition and re-creating it using Gparted from an Ubuntu Live CD might resolve the issue here. But not 100 % sure about that.