PCA Forums

My XP Pro 64Bit install was running fine.
I tried to install M$ Publisher 97 and the install seemed to go fine and work, but I had no progarm group or shortcut for it. I went through explorer and found the EXE file and the program loaded and ran fine, though it did not have the page wizzards and it said to run setup again to install those.
I've never had a problem with this disk or installing the program before like that.

Well I ran the setup again and it said it could not run now.
I rebooted the system, now I get an error when windows tries to load.

"File not found
c:\windows\system32\config\System"

I tried to run the Repair on the XP 64 disk, it does nothing, the recovery wants a floppy disk I never made because I don't have a floppy drive and I just been setting this system up.
I ran Spinrite #2 (it's an older Maxtor 300gig sata drive) so spinrite did not seem to find any errors on the drive.
I did not think it would, but I figured no harm to run it anyway.

So is this a corrupted registry somehow? Is there any way to fix this other than a complete fresh install?
M$ Publisher has always installed fine using this disk in a 32 bit XP and W2k etc so I'm sure it's not the disk. I figured if the program would not work in XP 64 bit then I would just get an error and it not install. I got no error but I got the program now!

I have my XP Pro 64 disk, I have XP Pro 32 installed on another working system. It his a corrupted registry or a missing file I might be able to copy from another XP PRO?
I could maybe install XP Pro 64 to another drive to copy over the file if it's just a file.

I nev er backed this one up I don't think as it's the new one I been building and installing stuff on. I do have a backup of everything on the drive from before I installed XP on the drive, but no back up with XP installed and updated yet.

Yes, registry is corrupt BUT why? You need to make sure the drive is not failing. Most of time when I see this it's either random corruption (like a power down before the registry is finished writing) or a weak sector on the hard drive, or a failing drive.

Most of the time Spinrite will fix this assuming the drive isn't failing and even if it is failing it might at least fix it long enough for you to successfully clone the drive to a new one, or copy your data.

Follow the basic instructions I listed in this other post: http://www.pcabusers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=48006

The only thing different is that you have XP and so you have multiple registry backups. So if you can't recover the registry with the options I listed in that post, then you can manually restore a registry backup that will at least get you back to the desktop so you can use System Restore to restore to the last good restore point using the instructions here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307545

HOWEVER, those instructions explain how to do it using a very tedious method via the recovery console. It's a whole lot easier to do it using a BartPE boot disc or by just installing the drive temporarily as a spare in another PC. Just read the instructions and you'll see what I mean. All they're telling you to do is copy some backup registry files from one folder, rename them, and overwrite the corrupt registry files with them. Easy to do from the Windows GUI but darn tedious from the DOS command line.

If you get it working make darn sure to run the factory diagnostic on the drive to see if it's failing and if so, replace it and clone your data.

Hope this helps...

I dropped by to get the instructions, I'll be working on these this systems soon as I can. Now, hopefully get them working tonight after I get done with a car and and stuff.

I'll be back on soon, I may not do WIFI again for a dya or more, so hopefully I'll get the home dialup running tonight.

Thank FP,

I got this one up and running again now also.

I think from now on I'll make a restore point before installing anything into XP 64 !!

Other than a corrupt registry I have not found anything else wrong. That happened when I tried to install old MS Publisher 97 into XP Pro 64 bit.
I never liked the newer version of Publisher so I just keep using the old one I have, it always did everything I wanted to do with it.

Leave it to an M$ program to crash an M$ O/S LOL
My other old program that did would not install I simply got an error message it was to old, but of course that one did not belong to M$ either.

How does XP-64 handle 32 bit apps? I noticed with Vista 64, they also include a 32 bit version of IE for example.

XP x64 runs 32-bit apps just fine. I run XP x64 on my main workstation and most of my apps are 32bit.

The 64bit version of IE is a joke. It can't be used. There is no x64 Java or Flash plugins available yet.

One of my apps that give an error and will not istall is from Win 3.1 days so i guess 16bit LOL

The Publisher 97 though I would think to be a 32 bit app but not sure. I am thinking it came out during Win 95 or early Win 98 days? It was when trying to install publisher that my system went down, Why Publisher install crashed it I don't know, but it did seem to be a corrupted registry I guess. I have it back up now just fine without Publisher for now.
Now that I know how to fix it I will try again later to install Publisher 97 sometime and see if it corrupts my system again.

My other system is whako again so I been offline!

Office 97 is a 32bit app. However I don't think it works properly under XP-64. Officially it's not supported by XP either, although it does work with an occasional glitch. 97 does not run properly at all under Vista.

Office 2000 is the oldest version I would install on any PC. It works under all flavors (except for Outlook 2000 which does not work under Vista).

2000, like 97, has no activation.

Thanks FP.
I'll have to look at Office, I think I have it. Not sure which version though as I seldom used it.

This was just MS Publisher 97 alone, not part of Office or anything.
I looked in the help file about, says Copyright 1991-1996 so I guess my disk must be at least 14 years old LOL