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Here is the short story:

I have a machine with dual boot Linux Mint / Windows 7. I rarely use Windows but sometimes I just need to boot in W7. So the other day, the W7 OS downloaded some updates and installed them while I was just hanging around, minding my own business. The next thing I know, the computer restarts, I am told by a message to not turn off my computer and like 6 hours later I realize that Windows were stuck and I cannot log back in.

I did the only responsible thing: stopped using Windows for about a month, but now I kinda need to work in a Win-only app. So my question is the following:

Is there a way to repair my Windows installation from Linux (my distro is Mint)?

My final resort would obviously be to just backup everything and make a clean Windows install but it would take about 4-5 hours with me doing grunt work to get everything where I want them in the fresh install. I just want to be sure that I'm not missing like an obvious solution here.

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1 Answer 1

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If you boot from the Windows 7 dvd you can launch a repair application that will look for errors and try to repair them.

Don't forget that your bootloader might get overwritten.

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  • It's a good solution. Booting from the Windows Recovery DVD will most probably get your Windows install into a running state; but, as @ZippyV said, chances are that you'll destroy the Linux bootloader, forcing you to re-install it later.
    – akseli
    Commented Aug 4, 2011 at 11:36
  • So, there is no application/repair utility that I can run directly from Linux?
    – F1234k
    Commented Aug 4, 2011 at 12:10
  • Even if your bootloader got wiped, perhaps you can use EasyBCD to add an entry in Windows standar bootloader for Mint
    – Martheen
    Commented Aug 4, 2011 at 12:10
  • Err, fixing the Windows installation probably require accessing Registry and the internal NTFS file, none are the focus of Linux developers.. :(
    – Martheen
    Commented Aug 4, 2011 at 12:11
  • It doesn't have to be from a Linux developer. I could live with a tool that was developed by Microsoft to help her "users" for situations like mine. But I guess, I overestimated Microsoft's will to help users that run dual boot :P Anyway, thanks for your replies. I'll wait like a day and then accept the reply as an accepted answer.
    – F1234k
    Commented Aug 4, 2011 at 12:19

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