Ref : EHA/End User Self Help/Common IT Services setup
Windows XP is a bit low on security compared to Windows 7 and Vista -since both of them have implemented the sudo concept of Ubuntu and the Mac. Windows XP however did have the concept of standard/restricted users and users with full administrative rights but these features and the ‘run as’ command were seldom used as users continued to use the system with administrator rights like it was in the days of Windows ME, 98 and before.
The result of such use (or misuse) has been a highly unstable Operating system due to the fact that the system was now open to attack as every piece of malicious code would now run with administrative privileges and rule over all areas of the system. Add to this the common use of unlicensed software and the accompanying aversion to enabling automatic updates and unlicensed/un-updated anti virus software has led to un-patched security vulnerabilities and thus a ‘crash – format – reinstall – crash’ cycle keeps repeating. We are covering best practices for installing/maintaining Windows somewhere else, so we will have a look at how to get an existing system up and running with minimum effort. The last option is of course a format of the system -which is at best tedious as you will need to install drivers, setup printers and all application software which if done properly can take more than a day!
We will be looking at 5 different methods of recovery failing which you will be left with no option but to do a clean install of Windows and the tedious installation of drivers and application software
This is one of the easier things to do when you have intermittent problems on a Windows XP computer -You can perform a disk check by right clicking your C: drive in MY COMPUTER > Properties > Tools and clicking on the Check now button.
Personally though I prefer that the disk check takes place with the disks unmounted, so click on Start > Run and type in chkdsk c: /f and press Enter or click OK. It should prompt you to schedule the disk check to run when your computer restarts. Type y and press Enter and then restart your computer.
There are two instances where you might want to run system restore:
In both the cases, you are presented with an option either to restore the system to a previous date (which are highlighted in bold) or to undo a previous restoration. However don’t expect to be able to restore your system to the date when you bought your Desktop. many times when critical changes have been made to your system, System restore might be unable to complete the restoration.
If you have a branded computer, it would have its own restore program in addition to Windows System restore -but be careful and back up your data! If you make a mistake and your computer gets restored to factory settings you might loose all your data!!
Sometimes you will be diverted to a black screen with lines of selectable text with options like Safe mode, Safe mode with networking etc… This usually happens if your computer failed to bootup the last time it was switched on.
This can also happen if you added some software or hardware which needed a change in some system settings. the solution here is pretty straight forward. Use the UP/Down arrow key to select Last Known Good Configuration (your most recent settings that worked) and press Enter.
If you need to use this, then your computer never even reached the above black screen. Usually Windows will complain that some required files are missing and prompt you to use the windows CD.
Press any Key... If you don't, the installer on CD will transfer control over to the boot loader an the disk and boot normally
Press 'r' to enter the recovery console
You will be asked for the Administrator password. if you don’t know what it is, probably it was never set (a security risk). Press Enter and it should drop you to a command prompt. If it says the password is wrong and you don’t know what it is then you will have no option to do a repair install (which resets the administrator password or do a fresh install after a format!
Among others, there are two easy operations which a user can perform. I will not cover the other complicated commands.
I suggest you do both as there is no harm in doing so as it takes quite along time to get to the recovery console from CD, so if you tried the disk check and it didn’t work, you will need to re-do the boot from CD exercise and loose another 15-20 minutes.
The syntax for running the disk check is different in the recovery console. Chkdsk does not support the /f switch here. So to run a disk check from here, type the following at the command prompt…
chkdsk c: /p
You should see several lines scroll past saying that chkdsk id performing addition checking or recovery. Once chkdsk exits, write a new MBR to your primary hard disk using the command fixmbr
Restart the computer. If the problem was not resolved proceed to method No. 5
A few important things to remember before carrying out this proceedure…
) without activating your computer unless you have an Internet connection that is always on your network/modem supports DHCP! Keep the Microsoft activation phone numbers handy…get it from the net as the ones shown on screen might not work!!!
Select your Windows installation and press 'r' to repair
Follow the steps above till you come to the screen where you press ‘r‘ to enter the recovery console. Instead of pressing ‘r‘ here, press Enter to move to the next screen.
Accept the license agreement by pressing F8.
If windows was installed more than once (In different folders), then there will be as many Windows installations displayed here. Normally there would be only one installation as shown here and it will be selected by default. If it not, select the installation in question using the up/down arrow keys and press ‘r’ to begin the repair.
This will basically do a complete installation of Windows without disturbing your files, applications and settings.
After this is successfully done and Windows starts up normally, you might need to reinstall and update your anti virus software. All service packs and security updates for Windows also will need to be installed -even if you had done so before. Basically what we did was replace the Windows files in your Windows folder with the original (older) copies that came on your Windows CD.
If this fails, then you need to format and do a fresh install…. after copying your data of course 
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