Incompatible Boot Strap - Cant Change active snapshot

[enli]

Hi

I like to play with many softwares and recently this HDD was hanging on chkdsk so i tried "Spinrite" on it and it reported 3 unrecovered sectors. Booted back to XP and it wouldnt go after the XP login screen ( I have autologin enabled ). So i run chkdsk from my secondary HDD and it corrected some entries in MFT.

I then again tried to boot my First HDD and it booted. But somehow the pre-boot was disabled. I tried to enable it but gave error - "There has been error enabling pre-boot". I thought something might be wrong with MBR or bootsector so i booted pc with Recovery console cd and run commands
fixboot
fixmbr

Still i found that FD has problem enabling the pre-boot. So i uninstalled it rebooted and again installed. Same issue !!!! I had the same issue 3 months ago but i forgot how did i fix back then. Now this is driving me crazy as i use different snapshots for gaming /testing new apps /some other work.

I m attaching the setup log and yes i m using grub which is from ubuntu partition if that helps. I have currently 5 snapshots including the active snapshot.

Regards
EnLi

EDIT: FD Version : FirstDefense Pro - Horizon Datasys 3.20 build 202

[pandlouk]

Hi Enli,

Here are the steps to take:
1. uninstall grub
2. use the fix mbr command from the windows recovery cd
3. install FD-ISR again.
4. Reinstall grub

Panagiotis

[enli]

Well ok i will try that and post as soon as i reach home

Later
EnLi

EDIT : How do you unstinstall grub ? I will google it meantime!

EDIT2: By executing fixmbr m i not installing XPs MBR instead of grubs ? It has the same effect as overwriting grubs mbr and ultimately uninstalling it ?
I m confused

[pandlouk]

{QUOTE-> Well ok i will try that and post as soon as i reach home

Later
EnLi

EDIT : How do you unstinstall grub ? I will google it meantime!

EDIT2: By executing fixmbr m i not installing XPs MBR instead of grubs ? It has the same effect as overwriting grubs mbr and ultimately uninstalling it ?
I m confused <-QUOTE}
It depends, from where you chose to install grubs in the first place. Did you install it in the disk boot sector or in a partition boot sector?

Here you can find a tool to specialised to uninstalling, fixing ,etc. boot sectors http://www.supergrubdisk.org/

[enli]

Hi.. thanks for coming back.
I already had superdisk,maybe this is the best time to use it.

Aside from that i tried Partition table doctor 3.5 on my current HDD and it reported error with partition table so i rebuilt it. But still i cant activate the pre-boot screen.

I tried FD v1.10.173 and it can activate the pre-boot but it writes MBR which dont apeal to me as i dualboot ubuntu and xp for which i need grubs MBR. After uninstalling v1.10.173 i tried v3.20.202 but still the same issue.

I will report back after using supergrubdisk.
EnLi

EDIT1: For this disk i dont have ubuntu installed on. So i created 15MB ext3 partiton and put grub files inside it. Then installed it using :

root (hd0,5) //grub files are inside (hd0,5) as reported by grub when used find /boot/grub/stage1
setup (hd0)
quit

So that means i installed it in MBR ..right ?

EDIT2:
I just used supergrubdisk.. used these options : uninstall grub mbr , fixmbr for windows , fixbootsector of windows ..but still i cant activate pre-boot.
What the hell ?
Last time i had the same issue and i killed the disk with "active kill disk" then only it was able to activate pre-boot. Anybody have a better solution please ? Or is there any similar software i could have multiple copies of OSes ?

[pandlouk]

Try the following steps.

1. Uninstall FD-ISR. (program only)
2. Reboot and run fixmbr.
3. Enter in windows and eliminate the following folders:
C:\$ISR\$APP\
C:\$ISR\$LOGS\
C:\$ISR\0\
4. Run a checkdisk on c:
5. Install FD-ISR 3.xx

This should solve it.

Panagiotis

[enli]

Sorry to inform you but i had already tried that approach. But i will try it again and report back in about 20 mins.

Right now i have installed v1.10 which writes MBR . I will boot into another snapshot >> uninstall >> boot recovery cd >> fixmbr >> install FD-ISR again and see.

Later
EnLi

EDIT and update : I tried your approach still it cant activate the freaking pre-boot. I guess i will have to backup all my snapshots>> quick format C >> restore all the snapshots. :((

[enli]

Zero filling C: didnt help. Then i tried to restore C: from a TrueImage image backup and then using fixmbr and fixboot from recovery console. Still the same problem.

So frustrated was i , so i did reinstalled XP from the cd and then installed FD and it worked.

Anybody can enlighten why this worked ?
EnLi

Edit :typo