Boot critical file is corrupt

On my W8 machine: This morning when I started it, there was a notice that it was installing an update. It restarted and after that it was unable to boot properly. It tries to do an automatic repair, but that isn't working.

I found the log file at C:Windows\System32\Logfiles\Srt\SrtTrail.txt. It noted
Bugcheck c000021a. Boot critical file is corrupt.

I was able to run chkdsk /r. The problem persists.

I then tried System Restore. That listed 3 restore points. None were from today, but there was one from April 12. Problem is I can't use System Restore because it says I must enable system protection on this drive. Now that doesn't sound right, does it? It sees restore points, but it says protection is not enabled.

[FONT=Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman]Well, then I tried to 'Refresh Your PC' which I think is like XP Repair. After a few minutes, it said 'there was a problem refreshing your PC. No changes were made.[/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman][SIZE=4][COLOR=#000000][FONT=Times New Roman][SIZE=4][COLOR=#000000][FONT=Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman]Searching the web, I see others have had this problem, but I don't see a clear path to getting this machine up and running again.[/FONT][/FONT][/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT][/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]

I hoped the Refresh would work. Any ideas here before I reload W8?

This machine had W7 and I upgraded it to W8 when the upgrade price was 40 USD. So, it wasn't a clean install.

 

Thanks, booting into Advanced Options got me to a Command Prompt. Didn't see anything for an elevated cmd prompt. I had run the sfc /scannow. It responded with "Windows Protection could not start the repair service."

Working with W8 is stilll new to me. Gald this problem is on my own machine. I'm going to see if I can do anything when booted to the install disk.

 

Booting to the W8 install disk and running System Restore yielded the same results. It saw 3 restore points, but said “You must enable system protection on this drive".

 

That's a gripe of mine. Seems W8 did away with Last know good configuration in the Start Menu screen.

It may be covered in the Advanced Options > Repair. I don't see it as a stand-alone option, but my guess is that it tries last know good config. However, I can't be sure. I am sure that it's not in my W8 Start menu.

 

I ended up reloading W8.

I thought W8 would be more robust in this arena than I found it.

1) System Restore found restore points but said I had to enable system protection. What the f? This was from Advanced Options when booted to the faulty Windows install or the Install disk.

2) Refresh your PC - just said there was a problem. Nothing more.

3) Reset your PC - just said there was a problem. Nothing more either.

4) Booting to the Install disk and choosing Upgrade install: no luck here. Although there was a previous version of Windows on this machine. In the end it said that I needed to boot from the installed OS to do the upgrade. Well, that wasn't going to happen in this case.

5) Booting to the Install disk again, this time I selected Custom install. That's where I needed to be. It showed my partitions - the 100 MB and the larger partition where W8 was installed. I had the familiar options of deleting or formatting the partition. I simply installed in the large partition. Things seem to be fine now.

Note: the history - this machine had W7 and I moved to W8 using the upgrade that MS offered back in January 2013.

Sending this along for others who may be presented with a similiar situation.

 

On a positive note, when W8 was reinstalled, it saved the old files in Windows.old. So all the old user files: docs, musci, photos, etc were still there. Just had to copy them back to the active folders.