If your registry is corrupted in XP Pro, how do you start your computer?

Answer 1

Because you are asking the question you obviously know that the registry is corrupt. Unless you made a backup before you started fiddling you are in a sorry state and will need to use your recovery CD and attempt a repair. However, this may not work and you may have to reformat and re-install your operating system.

wdw

Answer 2

Will it boot into Safe mode? If so, you can possibly correct some of the damage there.
Does it boot at all into Windows? If so you can use System Restore. If not, try 'last know good configuration'.
Or try an XP CD and try going into the recovery console and see if it will restore itself.

Answer 3

If you know what you are doing, you can manually take off some earlier restore points and use them to replace the damaged registry, but its not as easy as it sounds.

Answer 4

1. Insert the Windows XP startup disk into the floppy disk drive, or insert the Windows XP CD-ROM into the CD-ROM drive, and then restart the computer.
Click to select any options that are required to start the computer from the CD-ROM drive if you are prompted to do so.
2. When the "Welcome to Setup" screen appears, press R to start the Recovery Console.
3. If you have a dual-boot or multiple-boot computer, select the installation that you want to access from the Recovery Console.
4. When you are prompted to do so, type the Administrator password. If the administrator password is blank, just press ENTER.
5. At the Recovery Console command prompt, type the following lines, pressing ENTER after you type each line:
md tmp
copy c:\windows\system32\config\system c:\windows\tmp\system.bak
copy c:\windows\system32\config\software c:\windows\tmp\software.bak
copy c:\windows\system32\config\sam c:\windows\tmp\sam.bak
copy c:\windows\system32\config\security c:\windows\tmp\security.bak
copy c:\windows\system32\config\default c:\windows\tmp\default.bak

delete c:\windows\system32\config\system
delete c:\windows\system32\config\software
delete c:\windows\system32\config\sam
delete c:\windows\system32\config\security
delete c:\windows\system32\config\default

copy c:\windows\repair\system c:\windows\system32\config\system
copy c:\windows\repair\software c:\windows\system32\config\software
copy c:\windows\repair\sam c:\windows\system32\config\sam
copy c:\windows\repair\security c:\windows\system32\config\security
copy c:\windows\repair\default c:\windows\system32\config\default
6. Type exit to quit Recovery Console. Your computer will restart.
Note This procedure assumes that Windows XP is installed to the C:\Windows folder. Make sure to change C:\Windows to the appropriate windows_folder if it is a different location.

Answer 5

With a boot disk.

Answer 6

I don't think you can, but you could reformat it. Good Luck.