Your Thoughts on the cause

Had a customer bring in an interesting problem.

This is a Crapware PC.. ie Acer.. 3mths from purchase..
WinXP HE SP2, customer installed MS Office 2k3 pro (academic Edition)
Celeron 2G8 cpu on a SIS chipset mobo

Symptoms reported:
Random errors. Cant open any office documents, and "problems" Browsing the Web

What I found:
1/ System had NVidia AND ATI Video software installed. the system logs showed errors on the ATI software going back to about 3 weeks after purchase
2/ System Fonts RS.(thats my best description), tick boxes, the close, restore and minimise icons(?) are non standared (certainly see the attached image)
3/ CAn open MS Word only by going to Start-Run and typng WINWORD.
4/ unable to access Add or Remove Programs Control panel (tried to restore this item by regsrv32 commands)
5/ System restore - can only access in safe mode, and can select the wanted restore point, but will not start the actual restore process
6/ Attempted to run the system file checker (SFC) with an error asking for the Install CD: Please see the attached image..: It is asking for the Windows XP Professional CD..?? But this system is a Crapware install which usually means that the SFC dosent ask for a CD at all

My Suspicions:
Junior Customer wanted to improve the performance of the Video, and first installed The nVidia Drivers and failed, then attempted to install the ATI Catalyst drivers failed again, this left the system with fragment of applications from both installs.
about a week ago a family member attempted to do an upgrade install to Win XP Pro, this install failed either due to the Antivirus, or a parasite prog, the system locked/froze/ or was interupted by a power outage. When the system restarted a number of files were corrupted leaving the machine how it is.
Another option was just a plain old bad shutdown, many system files open and were corrupted. this is supported in the event logs with an entry listing a disk check report listing a number of entries as truncated, this includes many Fonts, and system files.
Did I mention the Disk File system was FAT32?

the following lifted from the event log:

Quote:

Event Type: Information
Event Source: Winlogon
Event Category: None
Event ID: 1001
Date: 27/09/2005
Time: 6:49:32 PM
User: N/A
Computer: ACER
Description:
Checking file system on C:
The type of the file system is FAT32.

One of your disks needs to be checked for consistency. You
may cancel the disk check, but it is strongly recommended
that you continue.
Windows will now check the disk.
Volume Serial Number is 2629-16F0
\WINDOWS\Resources\Themes\Luna\luna.msstyles first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\vgasys.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\vgafix.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\dosapp.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\ega80woa.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\ega40woa.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\cga80woa.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\cga40woa.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\roman.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\script.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\modern.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\smalle.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\symbole.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\coure.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\sserife.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\serife.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\marlett.ttf first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\trebucbd.ttf first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\wst_czec.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\wst_engl.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\wst_fren.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\wst_germ.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\wst_ital.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\wst_span.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\wst_swed.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\tahomabd.ttf first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\tahoma.ttf first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\micross.ttf first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\arial.ttf first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\simsun.ttc first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\app936.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\mingliu.ttc first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\msgothic.ttc first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\gulim.ttc first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\Fonts\app949.fon first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\ati2sgag.exe first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\nvsvc32.exe first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\nvcpl.dll first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\mdimon.dll first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\CNMLM6f.DLL first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\srvsvc.dll first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\msi.dll first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\wuaueng.dll first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\mscms.dll first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\tapisrv.dll first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\Microsoft\Protect\S-1-5-18\User\2c5668be-83aa-4cef-89e3-d8a620b760bc first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\wbem\Repository\FS\OBJECTS.DATA first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\wbem\Repository\FS\MAPPING1.MAP first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\wbem\Repository\FS\MAPPING.VER first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\spool\prtprocs\w32x86\mdippr.dll first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
\WINDOWS\system32\spool\prtprocs\w32x86\CNMPD6f.DLL first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
Lost chain cross-linked at cluster 800769. Orphan truncated.
Convert lost chains to files (Y/N)? Yes
95168 KB in 197 recovered files.
Windows has made corrections to the file system.
78129056 KB total disk space.
791584 KB in 1789 hidden files.
114880 KB in 3546 folders.
10520992 KB in 53343 files.
66701568 KB are available.

32768 bytes in each allocation unit.
2441533 total allocation units on disk.
2084424 allocation units available on disk.

So either of the 2 options the good ole fat 32 did its trick..

So that is my slant on the problem.. (BTW: I am about to Format and clean install..unfortunatly with the crapware CD's.. but the system will be converted to NTFS after the install then patched) .
The customer will most likely not give me too much info.. "It not their Fault" . so any other slants on this story?

I would consider checking out the harddrive also. I had a similar problem on a laptop and it was the drive was damaged. If it is then you might get a clean install and every thing seems ok till the laptop is turned off for a day or two then , suddenly,you end up with the same problem as before except you are closer to the limit for the guaranty. Otherwise go with the first option that is about the only other thing in my experiance that could cause that much damage and leave the system bootable. Except for sending your laptop throught with your baggage as you dont have enought space in your hand luggage. That tends to make a mess of your laptop too :).

Hee, Hee, Hee,

Quote:

Had a customer bring in an interesting problem.This is a Crapware PC.. ie Acer.. 3mths from purchase..

When a person takes a machine that is still under warranty to a third party repairer, you just know that they have been messing with it :D

Reformat, reinstall and "fine them for their stupidity"

I must say that the FAT32 is a bit of a puzzle?????????? could it be that some of Junior's games did not work and some genius thought that FAT 32 would provide compatibility?............maybe that is when the XP Pro CD got used?

Like yourself, I am no great lover of ACER...................I rate them alongside Packard Bell :eek: but I am damn sure that they would not load an NT OS onto a FAT32 partition............would they? :D

Cheers

Quote:

they would not load an NT OS onto a FAT32 partition............would they?

A large majority of XP machines, especially older ones ( not counting ones updated to XP, ) I have seen ( and many home machines running W2K ) use FAT32. Don't know why, maybe habit, maybe something to do with backup/restore systems used by manufactures.

My first impression is also the hard drive, although I am puzzled by the two video drivers. ( You didn't say, does this machine have integrated ATI graphics ? Any add-on cards? )

My guess is someone kicked it or something similar while it was running. ( notice the files corrupted would all be in the same area on the disk . ) They knew they F*U* and borrowed a CD to try to fix it themselves but it keeps writing to the same damaged areas. Now they think because they damaged it, it won't be covered under warranty so they bring it to you.

I would be checking for bad sectors, let it run for a day or so and check again. If it was an “ impact wound” you shouldn't see additional bad sectors, and the drive may be usable for a while ( unless the heads were damaged, but that too should show up within a day ).

Good luck!

My toshiba laptop came with WinXP home on FAT32
With a cute link on the desktop to convert to NTFS

It's nice for people dual booting, since NTFS isn't really supported well :p

Quote:

they would not load an NT OS onto a FAT32 partition............would they?

unfortunatly with their domestic machines.. FAT32 all the way. at least all those I have encountered with HDD's upto 80Gb, the crapware Compaq's and HP's are NTFS. Any of the Acers that leave our store that I am able to get near enough to the sale will either have the Convert file system done on them and a few little anti-spyware apps. That one little step save a lot of calls back when machines have the odd bad shutdwon. see Acer support first step.. reload OS.. customers run back to me and pay to get things running again

Quote:

My toshiba laptop came with WinXP home on FAT32
With a cute link on the desktop to convert to NTFS

Hmm nice Idea. I have just updated my customers tools CD, this has the usuall fare of Adaware, Spybot SnD, SpywareBlaster, KErio, AVG. A html page with info on these items, and links to their download sites as well as an instructional.. Me thinks that supplying a similar script will save more of the same..

What I do with most machines I get with any fault that points to a corruption on the HDD, I will run HDD regen to check for and surface problems that maybe able to be repaired.