[SOLVED] Windows XP and Jolicloud

[thompkit]

So essentially, here are the problems and my resources:

I have an ASUS EEE PC 1005HA. Note the lack of CD drive, so any live cd solution proposed will need to be considered via USB.

I have windows xp professional currently installed on an 80 gb partition of my 160 gb hard drive. I also had partions for ubuntu 11.04 and jolicloud. Ubuntu was messing up, so I wanted to get ride of it, however, I knew that grub was referenced here as it was my latest install. I then decided I wanted to get rid of ubuntu and jolicloud and then just reinstall jolicloud to have a dual boot with windows xp and jolicloud. Consequently I loaded rescatux onto a usb drive and used it to repair the mbr for windows b/c I knew I was going to be getting rid of grub. After ensuring windows would boot, I then decided I could just delete the non nfts partitions, make sure windows was fine, and then do a fresh install of jolicloud. However, upon deleting the partitions associated with linux via disk management, i got some odd erros, and one of the linux partitions showed up as 517 gb or something very large. Disk management showed me some warning messages and advised me to reboot windows, so I did. Upon doing so I can now no longer boot into windows. When I boot into windows it goes into an infinite reboot cycle. By pressing F8 I can enter the advanced options and stop the system from automatically rebooting and actually read the BSOD error.
It is:
STOP: 0x000007B (0xF79AF524, 0x0000034, 0x0000000, 0x0000000)

If I attempt to boot into safe mode, it hangs on the line:
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\System 32\Drivers\Mup.sys
and then reboots and goes back into its cycle.

I currently have 2 USB's, one with a jolicloud .iso that I can boot into a live environment and another with the rescatux .iso. If I try to install jolicloud, it tells me that the entire 160 gb harddrive is empty. Also, if while in my jolicloud live environment I open up Gparted, it views the entire disk as empty. However, if I open up Disk utility it it recgonizes my 10gb partition to restore windows, and my 85 gb nfts partition for windows itself. Also, I can browse the contents of those disks from this live environment, so I know the disks are not empty and that I did not delete them.

I do not have access to a windows live boot cd nor the software to port it to usb (because all of that is on my windows partition). I do not want to have to reinstall windows because I have some important information. Can anyone help me resolve this? Thank-you in advance.

[reed9]

It sounds like maybe the partition table is screwed up. If that's the case, you might be able to repair it using testdisk.

I know Parted Magic and SystemRescueCD both include testdisk, probably some others as well.

[thompkit]

Wow, thank you so much, that worked. All I had to do was boot into jolicloud with my live cd (or rather usb), temporarily install test disk, and then follow the instructions online to fix my partition table.