Unsolved
This post is more than 5 years old
1 Rookie
•
5 Posts
0
107212
November 6th, 2011 15:00
CTRL-F11 will not access the Dell PC Restore by Symantec partition any longer
I have a Dell Inspiron E1505 Laptop that is about 5 years old now. I used to be able to access the hidden Dell PC Restore by Symantec partition by using CTRL-F11 once the Dell logo appears on screen at boot up. However that no longer works. I've tried it in many different combinations (simultaneously, first CTRL then F11, etc.) to no avail. I can see that the partition is still there but I cannot access it. Does anyone know of a way or a utility I can run that will access the partition so I can either restore the computer to factory install specs, or to burn it onto a bootable DVD for reinstallation? Is there a Symantec utility I can use? Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.
RoHe
12 Elder
•
45.2K Posts
•
172.6K Points
0
November 6th, 2011 15:00
Did you ever reformat the drive, or reinstall install Windows (XP?)?
This is kinda geeky, but it may help you fix the problem.
johnsepu
1 Rookie
•
5 Posts
0
November 6th, 2011 16:00
Yes I have done both before. The reason I want the original factory install is because something thing don't work properly when I reinstall from the XP CDs Dell provides. The drivers for the CD/DVD burner aren't right among other things. The factory install works perfectly though.
RoHe
12 Elder
•
45.2K Posts
•
172.6K Points
0
November 6th, 2011 16:00
Since you've reformatted the hard drive and reinstalled XP, you've overwritten the Master Boot Record. That prevents you from accessing PC Restore.
Your only chance to recover access to PC Restore is read/follow the instructions at the link in my previous post, assuming you didn't erase that hidden partition when you reformatted.
Guessing here, but it sounds like maybe you didn't install all the right hardware drivers, including the chipset, in the correct order, when you reinstalled XP from the CDs...
johnsepu
1 Rookie
•
5 Posts
0
November 6th, 2011 23:00
I actually did follow the order as prescribed by Dell when installing the drivers, but by that point I was already unable to access the PC Restore partition. It probably happened when I installed Windows 7 to try it out. I tried your fix but it didn't work. All the codes for the PBRs are off. I found a fix in the Dell forums to restore the MBR to the way it's supposed to be and will try that next. I'll probably lose my D partition when the MBR is restored but I'll deal with that when it happens I guess. Anyway thanks for your help. I appreciate your quick reply.
RoHe
12 Elder
•
45.2K Posts
•
172.6K Points
0
November 7th, 2011 10:00
Be sure to back up your files on external media first, just to be safe. :emotion-5:
Dan Goodell is the recognized expert on fixing access to PC Restore so I'd follow his instructions (link is in one of my previous posts) . He used to be active on these forums but we haven't seen him around here in a long time...
Good luck!
juniorbyron
5 Posts
0
February 22nd, 2012 11:00
yes dan goodell download the file DSRFIX zip unpack the use the dsrfiscd.iso to burn to a cd or floppy disk the start your pc booting from cd or floppy as your first drive then at the command prompt type DSRFIX/F and it should allow you to repair the MBR IF IT GIVE YOU AN ERROR DONT GIVE UP AS IT WORK FOR ME AND I WAS able to restore my pc to original dell as i had a major problem and i had to install windows from cd which cause the MBR boot code not to match trust me the program works
Download dsrfix.zip from www.goodells.net/dellrestore/files/dsrfix.zip. (Updated 08-20-2006 to version 3.0)
Extract dsrfix.com from the archive.
(Note to reader: The other files in the archive are supplemental. The only file you need to copy to floppy disk is dsrfix.com.)
Boot from your DOS boot disk.
Run the command " DSRFIX ". Review the results to assess whether your system is a good candidate for restoring Dell's DSR feature.
Optional: run the command " DSRFIX /D > DSRFIX.TXT " before making any changes. This will save a dump file in case you later need the
data for forensic reconstruction.
If you decide your system is a good candidate for repairing Dell's DSR feature, rerun Dsrfix with the command " DSRFIX /F ". The
program will repeat its results report, then prompt you to queue any changes to be made. Accept or deny each fix proposed by Dsrfix.
After proposals have been queued, confirm whether you want Dsrfix to go ahead and write those changes to your hard disk.
Ryan2020
1 Rookie
•
1 Message
0
September 16th, 2024 20:55
For anyone who still has this problem. I was able to restore the image by booting into Minixp on Falcunfours ultimate boot cd, mounting the recovery partition using partition find and mount. And then restoring the ghost image to the C drive using the included copy of ghost32.
i will include the link to download it if you would like. Hope this helps.
https://mega.nz/#!DBJjjAKL!IU1jMVPpMjdv7PTETJovfGxKj4ZUPB0cViqi5T6LaEM
(edited)