richardg7vyi Posted January 7, 2014 Posted January 7, 2014 Has anyone else experienced issues with windows XP today. Around a dozen of our remaining XP computers have come up failing to boot with a missing HAL.DLL file. However solving it is proving difficult. XP repair fails to work . Replacing hal.ddl manually results in a report missing NTOSKRNL.EXE file too. Replacing both then results in a dll file missmatch error. It sounds as thought there are other associated files and of different types depending on system too. But it's strange why have they all failed this morning.
SovietRussia Posted January 7, 2014 Posted January 7, 2014 You might need to rebuild your boot - more information here -> Error message: "Windows could not start because of a computer disk hardware configuration problem"
richardg7vyi Posted January 7, 2014 Author Posted January 7, 2014 Yes possibly the case. There seems to be a lot of files missing from system32 and also from the inf folder.
SovietRussia Posted January 7, 2014 Posted January 7, 2014 Yes possibly the case. There seems to be a lot of files missing from system32 and also from the inf folder. Sounds like the install is buggered, might be a re-install.
AngryTechnician Posted January 7, 2014 Posted January 7, 2014 What AV are you using? There have been instances in the past (AVG springs to mind) where a bad definition update caused false positives on a bunch of system files and quarantined them, rendering the system unusable. Not aware that a large number of different files have been affected before though.
richardg7vyi Posted January 7, 2014 Author Posted January 7, 2014 We have around 20 XP machines failed since yesterday evening with same issue. Windows 7 machines still fine. We use centrally managed Sophos AV. Did occur to us about false positive situation but sophos logs for failed machines show no reports of action taken recently on those machines. A colleague has got one machine running by copying contents of system32 and inf folders from one machine to another and now machine boots into windows but obviously this will have caused driver issues and probably some other funnies.
richardg7vyi Posted January 7, 2014 Author Posted January 7, 2014 No idea at present what caused this. Repair is proving unworkable due to amount of messed up DLL's etc. Looks like best option is re-clone affected machines or on newer ones take opportunity to upgrade to windows 7.
m25man Posted January 7, 2014 Posted January 7, 2014 Is your Sophos set to delete or quarantine on infection? Also had this when Sophos picked up a bad definition file - Support recommend the cleanup policy be set to deny access only. That way if there is a problem it wont eat half of your hard disk if there is a bug detected.
free780 Posted January 7, 2014 Posted January 7, 2014 Its definitely a sign. You could try a offline sfc command. You'd need a working xp laptop and a usb to ide/sata cable.
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now