Win XP Pro stuck at loading splash screen

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(this is #3 of 3 posts)

AND:

Just caught one other thing. Alcohol starts a service at startup. If you run Serviwin and look at services. its StarWind or something like that. You can also just do a Find in Serviwin for "Alcohol". You should check if they start any programs as well.. I would try this even before trying an uninstall

If Alcohol runs any programs at application startup, suppress it.
  1. Download Mike Lin's Startup Control Panel
  2. After installs, open Control Panel, look for Startup and double click to open
  3. Look at each line item under each tab in the Startup control panel you just opened. Anything there from Alochol? Might be zero, one or more items. If you see any, uncheck the box. This will keep them from autostarting on startup.

Disable the Alcohol Service. Don't let it start
  1. Now start Serviwin
  2. Display Services
  3. Find the StarWind service (or similiar name) from Alcohol
  4. Highlight the line and right click. Change Startup Type to Disabled
  5. Close Serviwin. Try rebooting
 
1. Uninstalling Alcohol and sptd.sys:
*Yeah I do need Alcohol.
*SPTD is removed since i deleted it's .sys file (my XP is patched in a way that WFP doesn't bug me,:D so sptd.sys wont be coming back after reboot)
*MyUninstaller has no entry for Alcohol
*sptd is not listed Device Manager even under hidden.
*should I reinstall Alcohol then uninstall it? can't find any other way to uninstalling it.

2. They all stated okay with no hangs.

3. Not FAT system, jus ol' NTFS, no alcohol virtual stuff show up either.

"If Alcohol runs any programs at application startup, suppress it."
Nothin from Alcohol in Mike Lin's Startup Control Panel.

"Disable the Alcohol Service. Don't let it start"
OK, done.

When I try to uninstall Alcohol using it's own uninstallation (Start->All Programs->Alcohol 120%->Uninstall Alcohol 120%)
an error comes saying "Setup is unable to validate installation"
 
You should create System Check Points as you remove/change things. It can help at recovery but it’s not a system backup so using Restore is not guaranteed
  1. Current startup. How’s it currently behaving?
    • So approx how long does a normal startup take now? How long was it before problem first happened? The two times still wildely apart or in the same ballpark?
    • If startup time is still way too long (or your having other startup problem) could you provide a bootlog along with the XP Event Logs one of the current normal startups?
      • Run EventExplorer.
      • Click 2nd icon on left to create a workspace for the local computer (i.e. yours)
      • Create the workspace on disk for the Event Logs. File->Save As to a filename with extension .elx
      • Shutdown machine. & Note the time then Start machine & Enable bootlog.
      • Continue Startup. When done post the bootlog and the log workspace file (extension .elx)
  2. WFP
    • Actually, WFP only protects Windows files. It wouldn’t be monitoring sptd.sys
    • I know I had you look for sptd.sys but that was overkill just to be certain it was deleted
    • Don’t know why you may have disabled WFP and don’t care other then if you want to clean up your system then you should really have it turned on. And you should manually invoke System File Checker. To run it, ou can google it or go to microsoft.com/support website to search their Knowledge Database.
  3. sptd.sys
    • I think you’re missing part of the point about sptd.sys. In general, is best for a driver to be either disabled (thru Windows, not Del key) or entirely uninstalled to assure no side effects from driver entries still around (e.g. in the registry which still points to the directory where the executable .sys file is missing)
    • All said, sptd.sys is still a special case (reading about it on the publisher’s web site). Uninstall it using the tool provided in the link in my previous post. I would uninstall this first (not just delete!) before attemping Alcohol
    • There were some cases where people swore to uninstalling / reinstalling just sptd.sys. Up to you if u rather do that by itself first. If you decide to do it, use v.150
  4. Alcohol
    • How many times you use this tool since installed?
    • I ask just because it sounds like it never installed correctly in the first place. Do you recall any error messages? (If MyUninstaller doesn’t include Alcohol it either failed before finish or somehow the uinstall file in the directory got deleted)
    • Look through the Program Files/Alcohol subdirectory for anything might be uninstall related. You can also look under Documents and Settings/Application Data/user/Alcohol subdirectory where user is either your user name or All Users, depending on how Alcohol was installed. NOTE: You may need to change your folder options to see these files and folders. Application Data is also often kept hidden from the user
    • And, yea, when all else fails you can try the reinstall. (but first uninstall not delete sptd.sys) Or you can also try posting in the Alcohol Support Forum see if does any good.
  5. Misc – just some thoughts, you can choose to do or not do. Some of these are just my 2cents worrth
    • Just so we’re in sync. When you looked in Dev Mgr for sptd.sys it may have a different name but similar name like SCSI Pass Through Direct.
    • When it seems things are basicallly working and the issue Is on mostly just overall startup time, remind me to have you optimize your boot sequence. It will re-order and optimize device startup. I’ve seen it shave 3 - 25 seconds off of total startup time
    • Verifier. Finally, I came across something interesting.. Or at least something I’m not yet familiar with where you can have Microsoft verify your drivers while running. Here’s some references. I’ll let you decide if something you want to try at some point or not

      How to Use Driver Verifier to Troubleshoot Windows Drivers

      Selecting Driver Verifier Options
 
Bad News

Thanks for the info.
Actually, Alcohol was working fine & i use it for mounting images a lot. But as i mentioned before when i got the "hang" problem i thought its from Alcohol so i went & deleted sptd.sys & SCSIport.sys which maybe screwed Alcohol installation.

Anyway, bad news is the problem is back :(:( (i'm sending this while i'm in Safe Mode). Also when it hangs i only get the bootlog of the safe mode, not the one it hangs. i attached it so u can see urself.
See i went to safe mode, then msconfig & enable "boot logging" in there. Restarted & went for the normal startup then it hanged, i gave it 30mins before i pressed reset, went 2 safe mode, checked ntbtlog.txt & only found one boot the safe mode one!!!!

Another question, can i install drivers while in Safe Mode?
 
I Swear this problem is totally random:confused:
I was like "let me try VGA MODE from the F8 Startup options" and boom normal startup again.

You will find in the new bootlog, the old Safe Mode & the VGA Mode boots
 
I have an asus board too (see my profile) and have had problems with it.

What model number is it and what ram are you using and what slot(s) are you using it/them in?
 
First off, make sure the ram timings printed on the labels are matched manually in your bios. See if that makes a difference.
 
In any case, seems you've come close to hitting something on the head.

The boot log you just provided is much cleaner then any of the ones i looked at before. Most notably:
  • There are no "loops" where loading has gone back to retry a sequence of load attempts
  • It's not even trying to load sptd.sys OR fastfat.sys now
  • Looks like you also have removed some Creative devices? don't know if related or not but another change i see

Is the Alcohol service still DISABLED?

If you're going to uninstall or re-install sptd.sys for any reason, use the stand alone 32 or 64 bit install/uninstall tools supplied by the vendor
 
@ rik:
I've no idea how to do that.

@lookin:
Yes, Alcohol service still DISABLED. about the Creative devices i was doin a re-install (had a small problem with it), so i uninstalled then re-installed again
 
Stuck at blue screen

hi there, i know this thread is a little old, but i am having the same problem.

my acer came with vista, and after a very long 2 weeks of searching and reinstalling, i finally got xp and all drivers working perfectly (no actual xp drivers available).

so i downloaded the trial version of acronis true image home 11, and what i thought i was doing was cloning my hard drive to an external 3.5" hard drive as a back up...But...ACRONIS MOVED IT!

ive went out and bought a usb sata 2.5" external drive, to manually copy the files over from the usb 3.5" to the new usb 2.5" sata drive, but "machinekey" in "Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Crypto\RSA\MachineKeys" wouldnt copy over... everything else has copied fine.

is this why my acer gets stuck???
should i clone the 3.5" to the 2.5" again using acronis true image again?
will acronis actually even do that??? im not sure that it will clone an external drive to an external drive.

safe mode even gets stuck in the same place.

could anbody please help me, ive been doing this for 3 days now...PLEASE???
 
Hi... a couple things first
  • You may be stuck at Windows splash screen but otherwise sounds like you have little in common with this current (old) thread. (Lot's of different things can cause gettin "stuck")
  • Regardless, you should be creating a new thread in this same forum with your problem (feel free to reference this thread if you think you want to) but if you want help on a new problem (i.e. your problem) you are best to create a new thread specifically about the circumstances surrounding your problem
  • If you want to try and get specific answers you need start with your own specifics
    • Specificy the make/model/memory/drive makes and models as best you can
    • Indicate operating system and VERSION (sp2? sp3? what?)
    • What operation were you doing in Acronis? A Backup????? A backup wouldn't move your files. So what did you do?
Providing the detail and steps you followed gives people a better chance of understanding just what happened and what steps might try next.
 
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