BSOD! Help! Probably a virus.....

[asjt3]

Hey guys,

I got a little problem on my WinXP laptop, namely, the bsod. It gives the error unmountable_boot_volume, which I believe is being caused by a virus that destroyed some of my system files.

Does anyone know of a bootable linux distro for a flash drive that I might be able to use to diagnose the problem and scan for a virus to remove it.

I can't even start in safe mode!

Thanks,

alex T

[EDIT] Even a distro where I could simply boot in to backup a few essential files would be great, thanks

[aliov]

I miss the BSOD , really i didn't see it since 3 years the date of switching completely to Linux, however i'm running it some time as a background and a xscreensaver.

About your problem, I don't think this is the right place to post, however nothing is impossible under Linux , but go to the windows forums and ask the expert consumers there.

[Freston]

EDIT: I assumed by reading your question that you knew little about Linux. I see just now you have previous experience. All the better, you'll manage. I could have saved me some typing though

I don't think it's that much of a problem if the OP knows a little about Linux or wants to put some effort in learning. You could back up your data running a Linux lifeCD.

I don't think however that you can get a Linux distro to clean your Windows drive and get it working again. You might, but it will be difficult.


What's easier is to download a copy of Ubuntu and burn it to a CDROM. Then boot your infected computer from this lifeCD.
You've asked for a USB based distro, which is possible. But it requires extra work from your part. I wouldn't recommend it, given the circumstances.

The strength and beauty of a lifeCD, making it a very safe medium, is that it doesn't touch your HD. So the hardest part will be to reach your HD, so you can write your backups to a USB. When you vave done that, you can decide if you want to 1) reinstall WinXP, 2) install Ubuntu or 3) install both OS's and dual boot (recommended).



Anyway, having booted from lifeCD, you'll want to both reach your HD and your USB-stick. It's here where you encounter one of the first big differences between Linux and Windows. You don't access drives, you mount filesystems. Difficult? Not at all! But different.

Your USB-stick will be automatically recognized and mounted when you insert it. It's now part of your filesystem, which means you don't have an e: drive (or whatever) but you can find all the contends of your USB-stick under the /media/disk directory. Look at that to get comfortable with the mechanism.

Now open up a terminal. It'll be in your menu somewhere, I don't know exactly where but it shouldn't be to difficult to find.

In terminal type: (or copy/paste from this post

sudo mkdir /media/hd

<sudo> means you do the command as Super User (aka root or administrator)
<mkdir> creates a directory
</media/hd> is the directory you want to create

You now have an empty directory where you will mount your entire HD. Don't worry, the procedure is safe.

We're going to have to do a little guesswork concerning the type of HD you have. Depending on the type, the kernel assigns it a name. But I can't make that out from here.

My first drive is hda1. But yours could be sda1, or have a different number.
In terminal:

sudo mount /dev/hda1 /media/hd

Where hda1 is an educated guess It might not work, then try sda1. If that doesn't work either, post here what type of HD you have. Someone more knowledgeable than me might know.
(In that respect, does anyone know a easier way that guesswork here? I always knew the device name of my HD so I've never had to look for it.)

If it worked, you can find your HD under /media/hd and access it. Copy all your important data to your USB-stick.

---------

I see the BSOD at work sometimes, so I don't really miss it. Once you get used to the stability of Linux, you will see why some of the Linux guys&galls (like aliov) have the BSOD as screensaver. We seem to think it's funny

[devils casper]

Ubuntu doesn't support NTFS write access out of box. You have to install ntfs-3g package to enable write access. I would suggest you to use Knoppix LiveCD. It supports NTFS write access.

[asjt3]

Thanks everyone for your great help! True I don't have much experience in linux beyond traversing file systems but I'll try to follow.

I'll let you know how it goes!

Thanks,

Alex T

[asjt3]

Ok I'm using ubuntu livecd. I have sda, sda1,sda2, and sda3. I've mounted sda1, but that seems to only be the recovery files. I've tried mounting sda2 and 3, but when I try to access the file, they give a permission denied error. Any ideas?

My HDD is a Seagate 120GB 5400 RPM 2.5" drive.

Thanks,

Alex T

[EDIT] I've found that what I need are sda2 and sda3, but again, there is the permissions issue. Is this because of the NTFS file system?

[devils casper]

I've found that what I need are sda2 and sda3, but again, there is the permissions issue. Is this because of the NTFS file system?

Yes. As I mentioned earlier, Ubuntu doesn't support NTFS write access. You have to install ntfs-3g package.
If your machine has Internet access then open Terminal and execute this

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ntfs-3g
cd /media
sudo mkdir sda2 sda3
sudo mount -t ntfs-3g /dev/sda2  /media/sda2  -o defaults,umask=0
sudo mount -t ntfs-3g /dev/sda3  /media/sda3  -o defaults,umask=0

Check /media/sda2 and sda3 folders. You will have write permission in both.

[asjt3]

Unfortunately it's giving me the message:

E: Couldn't find package ntfs-3g

[devils casper]

Execute this

gksu gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

Remove # sign before Universe line(s). Save file and execute this

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ntfs-3g

[asjt3]

Ok yet another problem: I seem to have run out of space on my device. I'm assuming "device" is the RAM. I have 2GB of RAM, is there any way to free up some spacE?