Windows XP has now been out of general circulation for desktops and laptops for about five years now, but there’s no doubting it stills holds a massive share of the PC market, around 40% looking at some recent figures. One of it’s features was the Repair Install option which in the event of a major PC crash allows you to keep your personal data while the core Windows files are replaced and hopefully allowing the PC to get back up and running.
A lot of people have used this option, a large number will have worked but some will have failed. One of the biggest causes of the repair install failing to work is Internet Explorer. As all official XP CD’s come with IE6 pre installed, that’s what gets reinstalled when a repair is performed, or at least some of it does. If you have IE7 or IE8 still installed, the files get overwritten in the Windows ‘System32‘ folder back to the older version, but they DON’T get overwritten in the Program files ‘Internet Explorer‘ folder! This can lead to a number of problems especially with black screens during the repair or activating Windows when you have completed the repair. As Windows now has a mix of Internet Explorer files, this can break the OOBE (Out of box experience) which is needed to reactivate.
Microsoft recommends any version of IE above version 6 should be uninstalled prior to performing a Repair Install, which in many cases is easier said than done if the install is in such a state, it cannot be booted. Luckily there is a way to do this via the Recovery Console on the Windows CD and avoid the problems this causes.
Firstly, boot from your XP CD, and when you get to this setup screen, chosse to Repair using the ‘Recovery Console‘ by pressing ‘R‘.
After selecting your installation and password if you have one one, follow the instruction depending on your installed version of Internet Explorer.
Type CD ie8\spuninst and press Enter if you have IE8.
Type CD ie7\spuninst and press Enter if you have IE7.
Type batch Spuninst.txt and press Enter.
You will then see a number of files being copied, there might be a few ‘Access denied‘ erros, but don’t worry. When the copy operations have finished, type ‘Exit‘. Boot back into the XP CD and now perform your Repair Install. Do not press ‘R‘ the first time you see it in setup or you will end up back at the recovery console! It’s the second screen like the one below:
If you follow this procedure before trying the repair, everything should install and the activation will be available once the process is complete. Make sure to install your chosen version of Internet Explorer again afterwards.
This should also work if you have done the repair install before removing Internet Explorer 7 or 8 and now experience the activation problems mentioned or any other problems related to Internet Explorer.
Fix Windows XP Repair Install with Internet Explorer 7/8 Present is a post from: Raymond.CC Blog