win8 Windows 8 - Dreaded Automatic Repair of Perpetual Death

[Izlude]

Well boys, it got me... The dreaded "Preparing Automatic Repair" endless loop in Windows 8. They say the only solution is reinstall.. but I've got to try to fix this!!

Here's what happened. I plugged in my MP3 player via USB and while browsing the contents, explorer froze up (when it fades to grey but you can view and interact with other windows that are open). Since it refused to close (Win8 doesn't like ending task on explorer), I did a reboot. It asked me to wait, or force a restart, so I forced it.

Upon booting, I got the "Preparing Automatic Repair"... which fails to repair and asks me to restart. Restarting brings it up again. I'll click advanced and try to get safe mode to go on. When it restarts, it doesn't bring up the safe mode options, but... the Automatic Repair yet again.

Attempted the following on the DVD insall disc: "Refresh (didn't let me)" "System Restore (no restore points for some reason)" "automatic repair (again)" "safe mode (auto repair blocks the path)" ok just... every option. Tried chkdsk (r and f and all others). Tried reparing the boot, mbr, and all those options (said success but doesn't help my situation.)

The most vital one I tried was sfc /scannow (also with offbootdir and offwindir options). It says Windows Resource Protection could not perform the task (i'm 100% certain my drive letters are correct, I had someone do this with me.)

What other option have I got? If I can't fix this, I'll switch back to Win7, iz3D support on there anyway and my Mobo's utilities will work on Win7 too... might as well eh?

[Izlude]

Update: I ended up reinstalling :( I'm certain this won't be the last time it happens, the MS support site is currently swamped with posts about it. I'd be grateful if anyone had a similiar experience, to please post their solution here. I'd like to keep my Win8 for sure. I found no viruses,malware etc.. or disk errors. The recovery partition somehow came up with missing files, and that's why my options didn't work.

[Danny Miller]

Just thought I'd throw my 2 cents in....

inadvertantly loss AC power to toshiba satellite p205-s6347 w/4gb mem running win 8. this unit had just been upgraded to win 8 from win 7 ultimate. Probably no more than two weeks of running win 8.

the loss of power event was exacerbated by no battery charge. however the unit on several occasions has come through the loss of power while sleep / hibernation was active and upon power recovery was able to either reboot or resume.

This is not a happy moment.

[PNWDweller]

Sort of on topic, but at the same time, not as much as it should be.

Having used Win 8 for about a week now, I must admit that I feel like it is a bit immature yet, but again - Every version of Windows it seems has issues right after release, then comes a service pack down the road which stabilizes the heck out of it. So, I am waiting for that. :) When I say immature, It is because I get BSOD's almost daily due to Kernel issues.