"system refresh"= epic fail=HELP...!

[Rickkins]

So, here it is. I've changed motherboards recently, and things got a little messed, with the computer not booting etc. Tried a few of the obvious things first, but to no avail. Even system restore failed, as it claimed there were no saved things, despite the fact that I had recently used it.

 

So, I used that system refresh, that one that claimed it keeps your files & settings.....

I kept freakin nothing.

 

PLEASE tell me there is a way to reverse this mess, and I promise I'll never do that again.....

[Dot Matrix]

Did you change mainboards, or switch in a similar board? Did you change processors?

 

A mainboard change would pretty much require a clean install. System recovery isn't going to work here, because the machine isn't loading the correct drivers.

[Rickkins]

There must be a way to undo what I just did, that's all I'm asking for.

[Dot Matrix]

There must be a way to undo what I just did, that's all I'm asking for.

Well, at this point, I'm inclined to say no. Your original post is missing some information. Did you switch out your board for a similar model, or a completely different board? Did you change processors?

 

Maybe someone else will have another idea. Do you have another system available to see if you can recover your data off this system's drive?  

[+Zagadka Subscriber²]

I've managed to swap boards before. It sounds like you're having an issue with your hard drives, or something physical. Try swapping to a blank drive and installer.

[Rickkins]

No, it's not the drive, the drive is fine. And it is, of course, normally quite easy to swap out a motherboard without doing a fresh install. I created my own situation by trying to use a shortcut, system refresh, instead of doing it manually. A mistake I will NEVER make again.

[+Zagadka Subscriber²]

Troubleshooting 101, swap out one part of hardware at a time. I'm not looking at your system, but you are saying that System Restore finds nothing...

[Rickkins]

I appreciate your help, but it is not the drive.

[Som]

I appreciate your help, but it is not the drive.

 

did you try looking in C:\windows.old\ for your documents?

[Rickkins]

Yes, I see the stuff there, but nothing actually comes back. I guess I'm gonna have to rebuild everything from scratch.

 

This is really my own damn fault, as I surely knew better. In what twisted universe is years upon years upon years of emails, email addys, bookmarks etc NOT personal files...???

[Eric Veteran]

See if this tool still works.

 

If the refresh finds files with bad permissions, etc. it will move them to Windows.old. Sometimes they are hidden and/or assigned to SYSTEM as owner.

[Dot Matrix]

Yes, I see the stuff there, but nothing actually comes back. I guess I'm gonna have to rebuild everything from scratch.

 

This is really my own damn fault, as I surely knew better. In what twisted universe is years upon years upon years of emails, email addys, bookmarks etc NOT personal files...???

Unless they are saved to the HDD in a personal system folder (Documents, for example), they are not going to be saved. Most browsers force you to manually backup bookmarks. The OS has no means of interfacing with the browser or email client (especially third party) to back those up.

 

In theory, emails should be backed up online if you're using Exchange, or Google.

[Som]

Yes, I see the stuff there, but nothing actually comes back. I guess I'm gonna have to rebuild everything from scratch.

 

This is really my own damn fault, as I surely knew better. In what twisted universe is years upon years upon years of emails, email addys, bookmarks etc NOT personal files...???

don't panic,  it's very easy to fix this, go to the C:\windows.old\Users\<your username> and copy everything, including the hidden appdata folder to C:\Users\<your username>  Reboot and all your documents and settings will be back.  You'll have to reinstall all programs like office, chrome etc but all there settings will be the same as before

[Rickkins]

See if this tool still works.

 

If the refresh finds files with bad permissions, etc. it will move them to Windows.old. Sometimes they are hidden and/or assigned to SYSTEM as owner.

Whoa, that actually did help...!! Thanks..!!

It restored most of the contents of my "C" drive.

What it didn't restore was the contents of thunderbird or my mozilla bookmarks.

I do have some backups of those, however, and even if they are a bit old, I should be able to start there.

 

Thanks.

[Arkos Reed]

Just FYI for the next time...

 

When you plan on keeping your OS install after swapping major parts like a motherboard, you can either :

 

- preinstall the new drivers with the pnputil command BEFORE swapping parts (planned change)

- modify your installation while offline with a WinPE bootable USB stick or Windows DVD (repair console) and inject the drivers with the DISM command and registry manipulation of storage drivers service startup (unplanned change after a component failure) http://www.dowdandassociates.com/blog/content/howto-repair-windows-7-install-after-replacing-motherboard/

 

Your machine failed to boot most likely because it failed to find the boot drive because either the SATA mode wasn't the same (legacy vs AHCI vs RAID) and therefore the driver wasn't loaded (this can be changed via a bios setting) or because the chipset was completely different and required a totally different driver.

 

System Refresh is a system restoration only, it isn't supposed to touch user files, and cannot cope with a motherboard change (it's not a cloning utility)

[Rickkins]

No, actually it booted fine, at first. It was after installing latest amd catalyst chipset drivers that the trouble started. After they started, I was able to get in via the cd/repair start option.

 

I have managed to restore most of the important, thanks to Eric's link, and some backup file I had using mozbackup.

 

Thanks all.

[Eric Veteran]

No, actually it booted fine, at first. It was after installing latest amd catalyst chipset drivers that the trouble started. After they started, I was able to get in via the cd/repair start option.

 

I have managed to restore most of the important, thanks to Eric's link, and some backup file I had using mozbackup.

 

Thanks all.

 

If you had more than one user profile you will need to run that on each one. It only restores the logged-in user's files. Sorry you lost some stuff, it's happened to me quite a few times.

[Rickkins]

If you had more than one user profile you will need to run that on each one. It only restores the logged-in user's files. Sorry you lost some stuff, it's happened to me quite a few times.

Actually by now, I have managed to restore ALL the important stuff right "up to date", fortunately.

 

True, all my installed programs are uninstalled, but most of those fall into the "so what, I can just reinstall them" category. Thus, I feel much better than I did this morning.

 

Thanks again.

[+Warwagon MVC]

Lets all not forget the amazing sysprep command. Probably to late for it now, but if you run it before you install the new board it will generalize your install so it will run on the new motherbard.

[Tidosho]

Lets all not forget the amazing sysprep command. Probably to late for it now, but if you run it before you install the new board it will generalize your install so it will run on the new motherbard.

Hahaha, the sysprep tool you only discovered a little while ago? LoL, that tool has been part of my life for years as a system builder. Rikkins, a little tip for next time. Keep backups of important stuff on an external before doing ANYTHING destructive. I nearly lost 2TB worth of stuff when I re-installed Mac OS on my girlfriend's Mac Pro server, and forgot my archive drive was in there. It wiped the MFT out and I had to raw recover every sector, lucky I stopped it before any bad damage was done.

 

Even make system images using TrueImage or Ghost, or linux based CloneZilla. It might take a while, but if everything goes wrong you won't have lost anything Backup, backup backup, and THEN use sysprep

[Rickkins]

I've managed to swap boards before. It sounds like you're having an issue with your hard drives, or something physical. Try swapping to a blank drive and installer.

So, as it turns out, it most certainly was my trusty wd black hard drive.(just out of warranty too)

 

After seemingly working fine for the rest of the day yesterday, and restarting perfectly a dozen times or so, I installed some drivers for my x-fi, rebooted, and bupkus....and no amount of cajoling brought it back to boot. I am able to read it however, using my son's computer, so there is some hope for recovery....

[articuno1au]

/headdesk

 

Well at least you got an answer.

[Rickkins]

/headdesk

 

Well at least you got an answer.

Yea, and after being so certain it wasn't the drive....  

[Rickkins]

Hmmm, new drive needs a sata driver before it will install, and the ones I've downloaded don't seem to be correct.

 

Any idea where these things may be hiding...???

 

Thanks

[Circaflex]

Hmmm, new drive needs a sata driver before it will install, and the ones I've downloaded don't seem to be correct.

 

Any idea where these things may be hiding...???

 

Thanks

From the MFG's Website.

 

By chance are you using a USB drive to install? Make sure you aren't plugging into a USB 3.0 port, I too would receive the message asking for drivers because it couldn't find my USB stick once the setup started because it didn't have native 3.0 drivers on the disc.