CF-18 blue screens trying to boot into Windows Vista

I have a Toughbook CF-18KHHZXBM MK4 with Vista?, 512 mb memory160gb HD that belongs to a friend at work and he asked me to look at it. When it boots it tries to go into windows but blue screens and reboots. The blue screen error is
0X0000007B,0X80599BB0,0XC0000034. I tried to look it up and said it means "Cant find hard drive". I hooked up a USB CD drive and ran Sea tools and said the hard drive was fine. Ran memtest86 said memory was OK. Ran Kaspersky rescue disc check for virus but was locking up after 16%. Finally got it to finish didn't find anything. Does anyone know what version of Vista is used for the upgrade of the CF-18? Is there a vista recovery disk for this model? My friend said this Toughbook has some automotive diagnostic software on it that he doesn't have the disks to reinstall it (costs about $500) so I am trying to recover and keep the programs intact. Someone must have put the Vista upgrade at one time because every thing I search for says it comes with XP. Could the hard drive controller be bad? Also when I got it I noticed the Bios time was way off and I corrected it but 2 weeks later I checked it again and it was off a couple of hrs even with it plugged in to the power. Bad CMOS battery? Very little settings in Bios, no sata or IDE setting. Maybe custom Bios??
Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

 

Put the hard drive in a usb case and try to make a backup just in case.


CMOS battery should be changed.
I would try different memory first.

K - Pentium M 753 - 1.2GHz (Centrino) 802.11a/b/g
H - 10.4 XGA High Bright Touchscreen
H - 60GB HDD - 512MB RAM - dual ant. connectors
Z - No integrated options
X - Base model
B - Windows XP Pro SP2
M-North America

 

Ok thanks , I will try to order a CMOS battery The 512mb memory looks to be built in to the motherboard, I will order some memory, I think I saw its ddr2 PC3200?

I only see used? CMOS batteries, Found some Crucial DDR2-667 memory for sale.
Is it a good Idea to use used batteries? Will try the battery first.

 

can you splice wires?

 

Maybe bad time-zone with automatic clock correction?
When I had a problem with CMOS battery in CF-18, it's clock switched to default time, not "a couple of hours" and every time I started a PC I had a message about that problem.

I think a problem with HDD is a problem with HDD controller's driver.
You can boot from Hirens CD/USB and use it's "fix HDD controller" (something like that) in Hirens menu (Windows).

 

Yes I can solder and splice wires. I used to work on CB radios back in the 70's. Oh I forgot to mention the CF18 won't go into safe mode or any of the F8 options. Got my first desktop in 1998 and built my own desktops since then. Current desktop is a Gigabyte P43T-ES3G,E8400 dual core,8GB ram Win 7.
Have a new to me laptop Toshiba model ? i3 processor 750 HD Win8.1. Hadn't had much time to check it out. My Gigabyte started doing random blue screens since November , I finally tracked it down to a bad memory stick.

 

here you go then.....Some of these will plug right in to a Toughbook.

New T20 T21 T22 T23 T30 IBM ThinkPad 02K6541 RTC BIOS Reserved CMOS Battery | eBay

 

Thanks, a used one for the CF-18 is $10 to $15. Anyone know what version of Vista upgrade Panasonic used? I saw where they came with XP professional. I have a Vista recovery disk from another computer but I think it is home premium or something like that. I saw where a CF-19 had Vista business on it.

 

Any of the ones I have were Vista Business.

 

Still struggling trying to get it to boot in to windows, ran start up repair from vista disk , didn't work, ran check disk from command prompt on Vista disk ,said ok, finally found the correct info to run SFC from the command prompt on the Vista disk fixed errors but no change. Changed the cmos battery and added 1 GB memory. Ran several boot antivirus disks , the only one that found any thing was Zillya live cd. Bought a EZ recovery disk from NeoSmart , it wouldn't even start! When I told them about their disk not working, they sent me a link to a full Vista sp2 download. I down loaded and burned to a dvd, tried start up repair and the other things but still not working. I need to save the programs that are on it because I need to keep the programs intact.

 

Model Number: CF-18KHHZXBM
Status: DISCONTINUED
MSRP: $3,983
Description: Intel Pentium M 753 1.2GHzULV (Centrino), 10.4" Touch Screen XGA, 60GB, 512MB, Intel 802.11a+b+g, WIN XP SP2, Dual pass through, No Drive


what model is the hard drive?

 

You might try converting the whole hard drive to a virtual machine using the free version of VMware, then running the VM on another host unit running Win7. Not sure if the free VMware converter must boot to the native OS or if it can run on a different host and convert the old drive from an external USB case, which you need if if wont boot. This might bypass a hardware problem but not likely to fix an OS/configuration problem. If the software needs a serial or USB port it might take some tinkering but VMware does support those.

 

<<BACK UP THE DRIVE BEFORE DOING ANYTHING ELSE>>
Get a Linux Live CD.......
Boot to that and COPY EVERYTHING from the HDD to a USB stick......
Do this NOW while there is a slight chance to recovery the information.
I have been down this road, It ALWAYS ends in a new HDD or complete partitioning, reformatting and install everything new...If you keep messing around you WILL end up making the data unrecoverable....

I have lost a lot of information in the past by not backing up BEFORE recovery attempts..

 

What he said,I lost 750GB the first time and almost 1TB the second time.Pull the data off now,forget Vista as it will be slow as death on a CF-18. Get a NEW hard drive,they are out there and get the XP recovery disc set.

The recovery set will make your life much easier. That's what losing a Terabyte of info looks like.

 

At this point the best way to save your files is Linux LiveCD as Shawn suggested.
If your machine boots from the LiveCD you eliminate the mobo as a problem.
If you can access files with the LiveCD the drive MAY be o.k. but I wouldn't trust it.
This site says there is a Vista Upgrade for MK4. http://pc-dl.panasonic.co.jp/dl/
For Vista the bios must be set on tablet....(I'm not sure if that is a factor with CF-18 but it is with others... IOW F2 to bios and check settings)
And a lot of etc.....new drive, max ram and a Panasonic restore disk.

Good luck,

J'd

 

Thanks, any suggestion on which Linux LiveCD to get? I see a lot of rescue types. I think I saw someone used puppy Linux to repair or save. I have reset the bios , and replaced the CMOS battery, couldn't find any settings in the Bios for the hard drive. some sites say turn off AHCI and make sure set for ide but I couldn't find any thing like that. Very few settings in Bios. I have a windows 7 desktop or an external drive I can save files to.
I also have an old 20gb 2.5" ide drive that I could try to load windows on to test the computer motherboard.(I see Vista business requires 40gb) This CF-18 has a 160GB hard drive that someone had replaced at one time or another. The checks I ran on it came back good. The Seagate model # ST9160821A and I think the Bios #is 400l15, I think I updated it ? (Ben thru so much I can't remember).
What do you mean "For Vista the bios must be set on tablet" ?

 

I use Zorin for my Linux choice....It looks like windows and is easy to find things. It puts things where windows has them....

 

As above, great advice on getting your data off the hard drive BEFORE proceeding.
Zorin is a great choice: http://zorin-os.com/free.html
Another option is to download this linux distribution, which works well on older hardware: http://www.mepiscommunity.org/download-links
I've got it running on a CF-18 and CF-52. You can use Unetbootin to make a usb live cd stick to boot to, and then follow directions above to get all your data off:
http://unetbootin.sourceforge.net/
or you could just make a cd copy of the iso/image, but the usb stick is great to have as a portable operating system. You can run it in "persistence" and save your settings, etc.

 

Update!! Thanks for all your help, I have learned a lot from yall and researching the internet. Finally pulled the hard drive out and took it out of it's caddy and hooked to my desktop with a USB adapter.
Guess what? After examining the files on the hard drive I came to the conclusion that someone had pulled it out of a Gateway Laptop an put it into the CF-18. UGG! I was so mad, I had tried every trick to get it to boot. I did remember seeing a post of some one swapping hard drives from another computer and getting that error. When I confronted the owner about it he said it might have been his wife trying to snoop to see what was on his computer. He gave me a 64GB flash drive and I copied all the data off it. (had 22GB of videos and 20GB music and documents). He is supposed to try to find the hard drive that came out of it. May be in the old gateway. Now I am in a holding pattern until he comes up with something. I will Know better next time and pull the hard drive first!