Ghost 15 on XP Pro Blue Screened THREE TIMES on Installation

PeterN_ortonFan · ‎07-25-2011

Dear Forum members:

I joined this Norton Ghost Forum to find out some information.

I have a need for home office high graphics computing system, so I have a Dell Optiplex 320 computer 3.40 GHz. I have used Norton products for a decade or more on several different computers and platforms (even Mac). Unfortunately, this is a new computer to me as I just purchased as second owner in March of this year, using my older Windows XP Professional OS.

I purchased from the online store of Symantec Norton Ghost v15 2011 and Norton Utilities also v15 (not yet installed so I have yet no comments or questions about this one). I have also Norton Internet Security v15 installed 2011.

I had a brand new Maxtor 300GB 7200 RPM Drive IDE installed on the "new" Optiplex 320 computer and professional in the store installed WIndows XP Professional on it. I put several utilitiy programs and one audio program on it to run my CD/DVD.

I then installed Norton Internet Security 2011 with Norton's assistance (I can do it myself but I did not want to upset my brand new system with any improper installation. I then used it for about two weeks before I got the online purchase of Norton Ghost so by that time it was May 2011.

I installed Norton Ghost by myself as I've done this before for years (I buy every "other" year a new version rather than continue the updage program). I pressed "restart computer" and that was the last action I did on the computer.

The blue screen that appears on the boot sequence appears so rapidly no one can view the error code. F8 and safe mode do not operate. No other choice Dell and Microsoft and Norton said after weeks of effort but erase the drive and reinstall everything all over again!

I am trying to use this professionally, so while I have a perfectly good working copy of Windows Home XP edition that still works (without Ghost on it) on that Dell computer, I want to upgrade to SATA Drives, so I got the exact model that fits the computer. Raptor, by WD, 10000 RPM 300 GB. I had Dell install the XP Professional Operating system and my several utility programs the third party people (Avanquest) installed them so I can monitor the drive and protect it. I also had Norton install by remote control the Internet Security 2011 product again.

Then I called Norton and had them install by remote control, Norton Ghost 15 2011. AND IMMEDIATELY upon completion of the installation and request for "restart" I got the same blue screen problem and failure to boot to Windows (I know there are lots of pieces of information I am leaving out about the system and this problem, but I will answer any questions!).

After a solid week of effort with Dell computers, this time they resurrected the drive and went in DOS and managed to disable Norton Ghost leaving the removal for my call to Norton and the Symantec removal Tool (again by remote control only because the computer is "new" to me and I want to get up and running during the summer as I work in a University so school year is too busy for me to do all of these operations, so while I enjoy doing it myself its faster if others do it by remote).

Once again! I had the blue screen on re-installing clean the Norton Ghost, even after Dell removed all pieces of the Norton programs in and out removal from the Registry.

I "give up"! I have removed all traces of Norton programs and only reinstalled the Norton Internet Security as it did work as I know it does pefectly until I installed Ghost so not installing Ghost I am just stumped at what to do to "copy" my programs as I have about 150 programs (on my "data" drives) I use for various graphics, OCR, ABBY, scanning control, DVD creation and editing functions just waiting to be installed (Yes there are newer programs for the Vista or WIndows 7 but I'm used to WIndows XP and trying to just use this computer as a bridge computer until circa 2014 when support for XP ends and I'll have to migrate all my video/DVD materials to a Windows 7 machine.

If someone can read and check this out, and see if this is the right forum for me to inquire about the malfunctioning of the Norton Ghost I would appreciate it. I currently have circa 900 GB of data to be saved to two Tetrabyte drives (WD MyBook essentials) I have purchased for this purpose and am just waiting to accomplish this so I can begin using the new computer the way it was designed to be used.

This is totally stumping me and all the experts at Norton/Symantec Dell and Microsoft.

An old time Fan and supporter of Peter Norton

Brian_K · ‎04-19-2009

Peter,

Just to get the ball rolling, how many HDs do you have in that computer and how are the HDs partitioned? Partition sizes and amount of Free Space in each partition?

Brian_K · ‎04-19-2009

PeterN_ortonFan,

Have you fixed it? How?

PeterN_ortonFan · ‎07-25-2011

Hi Brian_K!:

Thanks for taking an interest in my problem.

Sorry for the lack of response (major clear-cutting job and I'm no Paul Bunyan! took precedence over computer work for past 3 days).

In answer to have I 'fixed" it the answer is yes and no. I have my XP Professional drive back (see 4 hours detail below as how long it took to accomplish that task), and cleaned it up and used various system utilities (non-Norton as I can't take risk of loading anything else from Norton just yet), so the drive is up and running, but having "no" real programs other than various utilities it does nothing but "run" and confirm its working according to diagnostics. As for Norton, until I find answers here or elsewhere (trying everywhere!) I am not yet saving programs/files using Norton Ghost, nor have I attempted to load Norton Ghost or any additional Norton Products I have, in again.

Getting back to your reply. How detailed do you want the rest of your question to be answered? I've used Avanquest's (was VComm) Partition Commander for over a decade and I have partitions/drives up to Letter "Z" which can be either one of two Terabyte new empty drives. But when the disasters occurred, I either had only one drive inside the computer case itself (Described below) or I had none the second time as Dell advised me for the second installation just to try it installing the Ghost running the "W" Drive only.

I have one IDE Drive on the mother board now (It was on a PCI Card for the first installation attempt of Ghost, but I removed the data and power cables during the second failed installation of Ghost so I think and hope its not the problem.

The Other internal drive housing was a brand new Maxtor Drive (when I chose the computer in March 2011, it had no drives as the corporate owner took their drives with them, so I knew I wanted my old drive moved into the case (as a slave but it has its own XP Home Edition of Windows so it can and has booted to that especially when I lost the other drive, it was a lifesaver allowing Dell to remotely investigate the hardware of the computer while the other drive was still showing blue screens and not booting to windows so we know there is nothing wrong with the motherboard, etc.

After the first failure, even though the Dell DOS based checkdisk and their own BIOS disk diagnostic programs passed the Maxtor Drive, it refused to go into safe mode or do anything at all, so I removed it and purchased the drive that should have been there (plus some).

I am now running in the first, master internal drive (Drive 0), (I wish I could write as well as they do in the computer books sorry!), a Western Digital Raptor 10,000 RPM 300 GB Drive with 16 MB Cache, which is just perfect for my applications whenever I get the computer running and saving to Ghost so I can install them. Unfortunately, trying to install Ghost to this brand new drive (purchased directly from Dell itself, and installed using their hardware help line on the phone) still resulted in the blue screen. But this time someone at Dell software managed, over FOUR hours of telephone time, to barely save the unit and resurrected the Windows XP (with some errors on the desktop and programs which Norton and Dell Software Solutions working together one by one slowly fixed up including reestablishing my wireless internet only after I used an Ethernet cable first for them to work on the XP Professional system by remote control. (In other words, something I really do not want to repeat too many times in my life!) a 50 ft Ethernet cable until I got the USB Wireless router, repeater and Apple wireless transmitter attached to the RCA Cable Modem to work. (If its confusing its a long long sad tale of how it ended up that way, but if that is what is needed to install Ghost properly maybe that is what makes my computer different enough but no one has said that is any problem, yet you get this information to be complete.

I've written a lot but not answered your questions directly here goes:

Drive 0 Internal is NOW: One un-partitioned Drive labeled "W" by the Windows XP Professional Program on reinstalling it after the first failure of the Ghost system and purchase of the Raptor Drive from Dell. It has one 300 (279 actual size) GB Partition, as I have not done anything to it yet as I have no more free partition letters to give it yet (trying to save my other partitions and drives first so I can use "dynamic drives" which XP Professional has (not the Home) and for which I purchased it in March 2011 to be able to free up the drive letters (or so I have been told---but I guess I should save THAT question of how I should physically do this feat for another forum ok?)

Drive 1 Internal is my old original drive from other computer with circa 150 programs running under XP Home Edition. I hope to install one by one upgrades either on this drive or migrate them to Drive 0 or a new SATA drive eventually but for now, there is no other copy of this drive, therefore the need for Ghost. It is 250 GB almost full, with Partitioned into Drives C through R, multi-boot operating systems, with Drives S and T DVD optical drives letters taken up by Microsoft assigning drive letters.

There are three Systems in Three Primary Drives.

There is one System (XP Home) in the Extended Partition along with 12 other Logical Drives.

External to the computer on Firewire 800 cables are four more Primary Drives with just data in IEEE 1394 drive cases. (250 GB) (System Drives W and U are set to alternately hide/reveal by the latest installation of Windows XP Professional, its not what I wanted but as long as it worked I have not restored it to C/C which is what the drives should be switching and hiding and did so on my old computer.

Further Details from Partition Commander lists the drives above as:

Drive 0: Drive"W" 300 GB 279 actual GB size 9.6 used leaving 269.7 free

Drive 1: all number in GB:

size used free

Local Disk Q 9.7 2.7 6.9

Local Disk R 7.8 2.1 5.6

Local Disk C 29.2 13.2 16.0

Extended Partition 53.7

D 1.9 1.4 <1GB

E 1.9 .9 1

F 2.0 1.4 <1GB

G 2.0 <1GB 1.2

H 4.0 1.8 2.1

I 2.0 1.4 <1GB

J 1.9 1.3 <1GB

K 1.9 <1GB 1.2

L 1.9 1 <1GB

M 1.9 1.1 <1GB

N 2.0 1.8 <1GB

O 2.0 1.6 <1GB

Local Disk P 15.7 13.2 2.5

There are multiple unnamed sectors which are unallocated as "buffers" which I can leave or use for expanding a drive sector if it needs more space which are not listed above, thereby explaining any discrepancy in original drives size vs free/used space.

Thanks for reading all my notes.

I hope this long explanation helps in determining where the error(s) lie.

P.S. Peter Norton fan is also named Brian

DaveH · ‎01-06-2010

What is it your trying to achieve here?

Do you want to try to figure out what is causing the problem so you can install Ghost?

Do you know the blue screen error you got or what Dell did to allow you to boot again?

On Drive 1, you have partitions Q, R, and C. In that order, all primary partitions.

With C being windows XP.

What are the 2 other operating systems and since XP is last what boot manager are you using?

Sorry if I misunderstood anything.

Dave

Brian_K · ‎04-19-2009

PeterN_ortonFan,

I'm afraid I can't see the forest for the trees. Too many trees. I've no idea why Ghost is playing up. My only positive comment is you should be able to make cold image backups from the Ghost boot disk.

PeterN_ortonFan · ‎07-25-2011

Hi DaveH:

Thanks for replying and helping me.

I copied your questions so I can answer all and not miss any:

>What is it your trying to achieve here?

Basically, download and install Ghost 15, so I can make one (two!) saves of everything from past 6 years using the Ghost system now that I have internet access once again, and place all those data and programs files (while they are still working without any major problems!) together on one WD Terabyte Hard Drive external to computer and store it away so I can spend time readjusting all the files using Ghost to accommodate and take advantage of my new computer system from the older original one (See my reply to Brian_K below for a description of that 2000/2004 computer system).

>Do you want to try to figure out what is causing the problem so you can install Ghost?

Yes, please!

>Do you know the blue screen error you got or what Dell did to allow you to boot again?

No, unable to view the Blue Screen as it appears too momentarily to view with human eyes. I'm a graphics/video person, so after a while it dawned on me to take one of my video cameras, shoot the screen while it blue screened and slow the image down. Even though I have high def camera, the screen I'm using is just LCD so the image was always expanded and blurry as it appears only once and under macro focus range. Doing multiple times the Maxtor failure revealed a STOP error code we think is : either 3.1 or 2.1 at the end which indicates hardware malfunction. On that basis (even though the diagnostic tests came back ok I knew I was using two IDE drives on the computer which only was designed for one to operate, so I was very happy to exchange that drive out for the Dell authorized SATA drive I'm now using (300 GB, 10K RPM) much better for my intended use anyway.

Dell advised me how to try to restore the Drive. No method worked on the new (but unused until I got the Dell) Maxtor IDE Drive. I tried for a whole week before giving up that I'd have to buy a new drive (or reformat the new IDE) and chose to get the brand new SATA drive I'd eventually wanted instead. But for the second and third blue screen events Dell got the problem solved using the Windows XP Professional CD and "R" function. But note that it would not work until we kept tweaking things like BIOS or just trying agian and over again. Neither of us know what exactly brought the Raptor back when it the same thing did not work on the Maxtor.

>On Drive 1, you have partitions Q, R, and C. In that order, all primary partitions.

Yes.

With C being windows XP.

C is a long story(you see I have long stories). C is an locked drive I need to get unlocked by Microsoft as WGA locked it in 2006 along with all my internet connections. That is why I had no internet with the 2000/2004 computer and had to wait until I got a new motherboard as it took two years of research by Microsoft for them to tell me when they wrote WGA they "forgot" and ignored those like me with older "hard wired" RAID systems that cannot take patches to update them (i.e. get a new computer just because of WGA and that one cost close to $3,000 at the time so was not ready to spend that much just due to lack of writing for the WGA program.

>What are the 2 other operating systems and since XP is last what boot manager are you using?

I only have "turned on" for the purposes of this Dell Optiplex 320 computer drives two operating systems:

The older 2006 one in the P partition, I choose "P" for Parallel running Windows XP Home Edition. This is actually an emergency fourth Primary system Microsoft themselves installed as a favor to me else I would have had nothing operating while WGA was inside the computer. It has been in these since 2006, but in order to keep WGA from locking that drive, I've used all my programs without updates and without inputting any outside disks or files (outgoing disks only! were created), as the entire drive (and all the data drives have been offline/off the web while Microsoft and I investigated for two years, how to repair the situation). (Search the web, circa 10,000 others have had physical or other major damage from using the WGA program, I'm not alone, but it was never enough for anyone at Microsoft to do anything about other than keep my case open all these years).

And the new Drive 0 for the Dell computer (whether it was Maxtor IDE Drive or SATA WD Drive) it always had a brand new (yes new!) Copy of Windows XP Professional on it.

The Drives are booted using the Dell (F12) choice for Boot Menu at start up BIOS. I do have VComm's (now Avanquest) Partition Commander/OS Commander which did the switching for me in my old computer, but its not been used since 2006 as its on the locked C drive.

Thanks for reading all this. Hope it makes sense. I did each thing as it came along. Looking back and knowing what I know today, of course I'd have junked the whole thing the next month, but why do that when everyone for years said, just try this or try that! and I'd get back my $3,000 system and all the OS's (3) again just like new!

A Peter Norton Fan

P.S. In reading what I wrote I want to make it clear that this was the "first" set up when I got the Blue Screen upon restart of Windows XP Professional. After that I removed the data and power cables from the older IDE Drive so it did not factor into any reason why the second and third failure occurred using the Raptor SATA drive connected only. I also, upon both Microsoft and Dell's advice, removed half the memory cutting it down to 1 GB as both said using the "R" function would fail if there were too much memory in the computer DIMM slots. I hope this makes it clearer that Norton Ghost refuses to install correctly with just one drive and no programs installed in the computer, using half the memory.

PeterN_ortonFan · ‎07-25-2011

Hi Brian_K:

Now about all those trees....where have I heard that before.....

Oh yes, my prior computer....just a note to explain where all the messy drive lettering came from. My prior computer was advanced for its time. (2000 first 800 MHz motherboard upgraded everything else in 2004). Designed by a "gamer" , but after he left the company (PC Warehouse) no one else in USA would touch it as they really didn't know what was going on. Had four open hot swappable bays with disks in and out all the time changing orders of drive letters and multi-booting drives from Windows 95 all the way through XP skipping Millennium), including RedHat Linnux and C++ virtual operating systems. Now its all on and saved to that "one" left over 250 GB Hard drive before I removed it so the needs to save it again. Plus a hard wired chip programmable (EPROM? some name) RAID system for automatic copying, even though I had used Ghost before it and continued to occasionally copy until circa 2006. So the Drives were not been able to be copied for a number of reasons since 2006 and it took a long time to reassemble all the mini-drives into this larger one.

It is unfortunate that Norton stopped making physical disks as I'm sorry to say I never downloaded Ghost program until May 2011 and since it was never successfully installed I never made a boot recovery disk nor did I get one on the Norton Download store (did I miss it somewhere?). My 2006 Ghost no longer worked after two years so its recovery disk is first of all old and second of all I do not have it in either current drive. I checked to see if I can use it, but since internet will force me to upgrade it to Ghost 15, I cannot use it as it is (I asked once and assumed its still true).

I am concerned about backing up drives while loading in all these utility and etc programs so I did install and use Avanquest Recovery Commander 3 and made a poorer quality/type of Recovery Disk for both drives (I mean only for the Maxtor, as just had no time to get it done for the Raptor yet) at the time, but never tried using that to recover the drive as Dell could not get it past the blue screen, and we changed the boot sequence to load CD/DVD Drives first, but nothing would allow it to work as "R" did not work.

In passing I asked the Avanquest people if any of their programs (I have three right now and more to install once I get Ghost in) would interfere with Ghost and they assured me that they know of no major issues of their programs operarting with Ghost at the same time in computer, but if I want to be safe (and I do) I will remove all their programs for the next installation of Ghost even though only the Recovery Commander was running making restore points as usual.

I hope this helps.

A PeterN_ortonFan

PeterN_ortonFan · ‎07-25-2011

Hi everyone:

Reading my replies over I had written to answer Dave H that my Drives were Primaries: Q R and C in that order. I missed the words "in that order". All drives outside of the Extended Drive are in correct alphabetical Order, as well as any Logical drives within the Extended Drive are internally in their correct alphabetical order.

Partition Commander shows visually the correct order of the Partitions. Windows Disk Manager (where I got my listing of drives/sizes/free space from) lists the three drives in order of their "operational status" i.e. bootable Primaries first (Q and R both damaged in other ways) then the "unknown" boot drive "C" as it calls it. "Healthy" but unbootable. Which is why its listed out of order. Sorry. Did not understand it until I checked out why it was listing them that way.

Drives S & T of course, being Optical DVD Drives do change the order between using the two physical Hard Drives (0 and 1).

Thanks again for any advice on what I can do to get Ghost in to copy my drives so I can install programs and use my "new" computer!

A Peter Norton Fan