Laptop Died Z11

I guess my laptop (Vaio Z 11) caught a nasty virus last night, since when I was at school, I was kicked off the network. Shortly after that, I restarted after reinstalling Ad-Aware and Windows would not boot. I remember there being an error message saying something with the words "table" and "partition," which I assume has something to do with the SSD. However, the error message no longer appears. Anyways, I'm running Ubuntu now via USB and can see all of my files on the SSD (and I backed them up to another HDD just for extra protection).

When I try to access the F10 factory settings partition on bootup I just get the same blank screen I get when I try to start up Windows. Could the boot priority have something to do with it? (To run Ubuntu I changed it to USB goes first, though even when the USB isn't in the system, it still won't boot to F10 or Windows). So I don't know what's going on. Is there any other way to run the factory settings installer or should I just go hunt down a Windows 7 Pro CD and reinstall Windows that way, then download all the Sony drivers?

Thank you in advance!

 

Use the recovery disks you burned. There will be an option to fix your computer. My Z11 was worst than yours, it couldnt even see the files, but the recovery disks magically fixed it when everything else couldn't.

 

sounds like a damaged partition table? a virus could have corrupted it or the ssd disk has gone bad on its own. I have never repaired a bad partition table but I know its possible. Or you can repartition the drive and install again from scratch that would work and be best if it was a virus. The trick is finding out is the ssd bad or not.

the vaio recovery disk has an option for testing the components you could try seeing if it says the disk is ok or not, also if ubuntu has a s.m.a.r.t disk status utility you could try checking there, I'm not sure if ssd's make use of smart though.

 

They do, but you can only see that for the drives on their own, not for the array. If you are running linux, just check smart at /dev/sda, /dev/sdb etc. repectively.

 

I never made a recovery CD. *shot* I thought the F10 factory reset thing would be enough for me.

And the SSDs are fine - Ubuntu can read all my files, videos, pictures, etc. I think it's just Windows or some sort of structural thing that's damaged.

Right now, I want to get into the F10 factory settings installer - that is my goal. I'd rather reinstall Windows anyway since (I think) that'll wipe out the SSDs and reset them to fresh, right? So that they'll be as fast as day one?

 

Dude.... Always make recovery disks. How can the recovery partition help you if you disk, with that partition, goes bad? I make multiple copies since burned DVDs go bad with time as well.

Oh. Have you tried the simplest things like rewritting the MBR and the boot sector?

 

I'm not very technical as you can probably tell... how does one do that?

 

You boot up with the recovery disks.

Or you can use any Windows 7 install disk and do a repair. One of the things you an do is rewrite the MBR and boot sector.

 

Boot up using the assist button instead of the power button and see if you can get to recovery that way.

 

The Assist button does the same thing as the power button. F10 brings up nothing.

So at this point I should try a repair with a 7 disc, and if that doesn't work, format the entire SSD with the 7 CD and do a clean install? When I do that do I also clear out the recovery partition or no?

 

What about the intel raid utility (ctrl-I I think). Maybe the array needs repaired?

 

it doesn't have a repair option, you can only break up or create a new raid

 

A repair procedure should try to fix the MBR and FAT, I don't know if it will fix other serious problems such as partition table. One or more of the SSD in your raid array has very likely gone bad, every time I see a problem with partition table or MBR corruption it has been because of a disk failure. Just because you got data off your affected disk in ubuntu doesn't mean it isn't bad, that is why they invented smart status for disks to take the guesswork out of it. In the old days you just had to wait and see if more problems occurred, and then you would know for sure the disk was bad. Every disk has this type of problem when it goes bad, even ancient 720k floppy disks. I am not telling you though that the disk is bad, I am saying you should check it better before going to the pains of restoring the computer onto a potentially bad disk. You are at a great risk of data loss if the disk is bad and you keep using it, it can eat or corrupt your data without you realizing that it is happening.

Was ubuntu able to see the recovery partition? If you saved the recovery data from it and the data wasn't corrupted you might be able to use it to restore. I think the recovery data is the same type as windows7 uses. This means you can boot off a win7 repair disk, then show it the location of the recovery data, and it will restore the system fully to the factory condition.

If you are going the clean-install route, then I recommend to boot from a win7 disk, delete all partitions, make a new partition, format it, and install to it.

 

If you want to have a chance to return to factory image - don't touch the RAID. If it's not too late.
Do what you can (repair/new install) to have a Win 7 OS. You don't need any drivers - just install Vaio Care from Sony website. The F10 seems to launch Vaio Care from Windows folder. Of course the recovery partition has to be there.

 

Hey SurferJon,

Not sure how the F10 boot works on a Vaio as I do not own one personally and don't often deal with them. However, if you already have your data and you aren't sure this is a NTFS corruption issue, this is quite possibly related to malware (that is, if you're actually pretty sure you picked something up).

EDIT: Better yet, TRY THIS FIRST! Provided you've got your data, run a "Startup Repair" from this disc and see where it gets you. You want the x64 version, of course.

I'm a malware pro of many years. Problem is, I'm actually out of town on vacation at the moment... but let me see if I can get you started on something that may help.

First off, since you are (presumably) running Win 7 64-bit, you likely do not have any sort of patched kernel files. This is very good as XP machines are terrible about this and often end up with patched atapi.sys and other similar low-level kernel-mode drivers via rootkit infections.

Anyway, normally, the best thing to do next would be to boot to an offline OS of some sort, hook into the registry, and remove malicious entries. Since this is beyond your ability (and desire), I'd say let's see if you can't do the following to at least get yourself back into Windows. It's worth a shot.

• Navigate (via your Ubuntu CD) on the drive to \Windows\system32\config
• Rename DEFAULT, SAM, SECURITY, SOFTWARE, and SYSTEM to (original_file_name).bak -- for instance, SYSTEM to SYSTEM.bak
• Navigate to the subfolder called Regback
• Copy DEFAULT, SAM, SECURITY, SOFTWARE, and SYSTEM to the parent directory you were just browsing a moment ago ( \Windows\system32\config ).
• Reboot and try to boot the system in Safe Mode With Networking (repeatedly press F8 as the system boots, and when the Advanced Boot Options menu appears, choose Safe Mode With Networking).
• Copy relevant antivirus scanning files to your system and see what damage you can do with automated tools (this often won't work very well, but it's your best shot at the moment). I'd suggest Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware and SUPERAntiSpyware. You may also wish to try the ESET Online Scanner (free also on ESET's site; Google it), but I'd avoid opening the web browser until you are certain the other utilities have done their best.

This MIGHT just get you back to a working state. If and when any of this works, try a full scan thereafter with Microsoft Security Essentials to cleanup any remaining nasty deep-seated infections. If you cannot connect to the internet, open Control Panel > Internet Options > Connections > LAN Settings > UNCHECK Use a Proxy Server. Many modern malware specimens create a fake proxy to redirect through a rootkit or filesystem filter driver.

Good luck!

-Steve