Vaio recovery loop - please help

So here is my story. My friend got a virus, i backed up her filed and inserted Vaio recovery CDs that were made by me 8 months ago. I've inserted the CD while I was in windows. I have restarted Windows. I get Vaio screen, then i get please wait and then I get the following error:

--------------------------------------------------
STOP: C0000145 [Aplication Error]

The application failed to initilize properly (0xc0000006)

Click OK to terminate the application.

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of course the error is a blue screen.

I've tried inserting Windows XP cd, but the recovery loop takes over during the start up. I've tried loading bios but in the boot menu I was unable to select CD-ROM as the default booting device. Honestly I own thinkpads and I have no idea how Vaio bios works. I tried selecting the CD-ROM option with enter but no results. So right now I am stuck with a vaio with constant recovery loop and the windows CD is of no help.
Would someone be so kind to help me?
I don't know if this has to do with anything but the original internal CD ROM is not working. I used external CDROMD/DVD RW drive...

 

Hit f8 from when you start until the selective boot screen appears then select boot from cd.

Whats the problem specifically? Are you sure it's a virus?

 

clicking F8 does not do anything. the computer still continues its recovery loop... i only get please wait and then the error...
to be more to the point, the problem is that i cannot reinstall windows either by old recovery CDs that I have nor Windows XP CD.

 

Well your probably right that it's a virus. I had the same thing a few times with my old laptop, constant restarts and bsod's (blue screen of death).

What worked for me was using "norton go-back" which runs before even the bios screen. It happened again maybe once or twice after i uninstalled it(expired product code), so i just let the reboot cycle continue until eventually,maybe an hour or two later, it landed on the user screen at which point i did a system restore.

Not a perfect solution i know but it may be worth giving a shot

 

but should't the windows XP CD work no matter what? I mean you should be able to load windows installation process no matter whether you have a virus or not. what i think i don't understand is how to you vaio bios. in my thinpad i simply click "enter" to select an option in bios. in vaio clicking enter does not do anything. and i need my bios to be working normally so that i can set a default boot option from my extern DVDRW where the windows XP CD is loctated.

 

bump... if no one call help me with this problem, do you guys know where i could get help? i really need to fix this notebook. thanks

 

Can you tell us:

1) Do you have a Windows XP install CD (not the Vaio recovery CD) ?

2) If so, what happens when you insert the Windows XP CD into the drive, turn the laptop off, then turn it back on again?

-John

 

It should work. If f8 doesn't bring up a diagnostic boot selection screen i'm hoping it's still F2 to get into the bios screen? (maybe F12 either)
I'm not sure if you know that since with your thinkpad you just click enter

From the boot section try changing the boot order so that boot from internal optical drive is at the top of the list.

Sorry for the late reply!

 

HELLLO!!!!!!

Folks, the OP is dealing with an EXTERNAL optical drive. This is most likely the issue here. If the BIOS doesn't support booting from an external device the OP is out of luck.

Gary

 

So guys what do I do?
Can I install windows on another computer and transfer the hard drives? Would that be illegal? Is it technically possible? Would there be windows validations issues?
I am really really desperate, I have no money for a new computer...

 

1) YES
2) when I turn on the computer I get, Vaio welcome screen and then it goes straight into "Vaio recovery PLEASE WAIT" and then the error.

 

You COULD install it on another computer but ONLY if the other computer had exactly the same hardware as yours, otherwise no you can't.

Have you checked the BIOS and determined that it does NOT support booting from an external device?

If so, you are pretty much up a creek. Your choices are get the internal cd drive fixed. Or find someone with an identical machine and use it to install the OS on your drive.

Gary

 

how do i check that?

 

Keep pushing F2 from when you power on your computer.

When it the bios screen there should be a boot tab.
It will list all the ways the computer can boot, make sure boot from external optical drive is at the top of the list and try again.

If you can't get into the bios that way try F12 and if that doesn't work there may be something wrong with the bios version or mobo.

 

so i entered bios and the boot tab. yet i don't see "external optical drive option"
all i see is the following:
OPTICAL DRIVE
FLOPPY DISK DRIVE
HARD DISK DRIVE+
NETWORK

 

Well then your options are very limited. As I said before, you can get the internal CD drive fixed or find someone with an identical machine and convince them to let you remove their hard drive, replace it with yours, install the OS and swap their drive back into the machine.

Sorry, but that is pretty much it.

Gary

 

thank you so much for your help. at lest now i know what's going on...

 

I just thought of another way that MIGHT work. It is going to be a bit convoluted and time consuming but it MIGHT work.

Make a bootable DOS disk with fdisk on it. Boot from this disk and repartition the hard drive into two partitions we'll call them C: and D:. Leave the C: partition unformatted. Format the D: partition as fat 32. You must do this step in the laptop, because the way YOUR bios handles a large disk drive may be different from the next machine I am going to have you use.

Now pull the hard drive out of your laptop and install it in a desktop machine as an auxillary drive. (You may need to buy a special cable to allow you to connect a laptop drive in the desktop machine. But these are NOT expensive.) Now copy your Windows XP CD to the D: partition. Now pull the drive out of the desktop machine and reinstall it in your laptop. Use your boot diskette and boot the machine. From the dos prompt switch to the D: drive and run setup. This should start the XP setup. When you are done you will have XP on C: and you can wipe out the D: drive.

You can then reformat the D: drive as NTFS and use it as for your MY Documents folder. Alternatively you could use a partition app like Partition Magic or BootIT NG to delete the D: partition and expand your C: partition's size.

Good luck!

Gary

 

Hi,
I hope it's not too late...
I have fixed two Vaio computers doing the same "recovery loop" thing by taking out the hard drive and scanning for viruses via USB/SATA cable.
After I removed several viruses and installed the hard drive both computers booted fine.

I used F-secure anti virus to do the scan. You can get a 30 day trial on their website.

 

Hi.. I own a sony VGN-Nr37g laptop..I am running vista and now face the same problem-VAIO RECOVERY LOOP..I read in a forum some where that launching a start up recovery takes up to an hour at least to start. As I'm posting this I'm also waiting for the recovery to show any results..

What happened to your sony vaio?