mother of all rants.... (just my rant)

qwijibow · 07-17-2004, 09:27 PM

ok,, a little background.
i am a linux user.
my parents and sister use windows.
so i have a dual boot system.

i use windows one a week at most for maintenance.

one day, windows doesnt boot... i origonally posted this on a windows forum looking for help. but it deteriorated into a rant very quickly.

any1 care to score me 1 -> 10 on the rant o meter ?

-----RANT BEGINS------------------------------------------------------------

Quote:

subject: windowsXP FSCKED it again !

so....
ive been working on the LFS project, and smiling about how lightning fast and stable my new OS is,
but i needed to chat to some friends on msn.. my shiny new linux distr hadnt yet had openSSL installed, so msn doesnt work.

so i boot windows...
and SLAP....

windows cannot boot because /windows/system32/condig/system is missing or corrupt !
so i boot knoppix, and the system fle is there, fsck shows the file system to be fragmented, but intact.
i found a system.log in the same directory, so decided to read it... but some genius has decided NOT to save system logs as plain text !

my sisters work, and my dads photo album are on that disk. also, my sister relies on windows for her college work.

i can use linux to backup the data,

but i reeeealy dont want to re-install windows !
i dont have the time !

im considering slaping my XP disk in and jitting the 'r' key. (after un-plugging my linux disk of-course)
but knowing my luck, it will do more harm than good.

anyways...

question 1: WHY oh WHY did windows corrup its own system file ?
question 2: i dont trust windows auto update... was this to blame ?
question 3: how do i fix it ?
question 4: how do i stop this happening again ?
question 5: WHY ME !

its things like this that make me want to b1tch slap every1 who answers "windows xp has never crashed for me" when i vent my frustration at them.

edit: the recomended advice... (booting windows xp install CD with 'r' put me into a DOS command line mode.
[sarcasm] which helped no end[/sarcasm]

go on.. say it... im gonna have to re-install arnt i ?

-------------------------------------------------- reply to my first post

sorry to say it but:

Quote:
"windows xp has never crashed for me"

bitch slap me all you like but windows update is your friend It may be the nature of your dual boot system that is causing these problems? Just a speculation. What are your specs?

---------------------------------------------------- my second rant

m not dual booting... (well..., not in the usual sence)

considering the flimsyness of XP, i decided to leave the XP disk alone when installing linux to a seperate disk.

the windows disk, and linux are completely seperate, each disk has its own MBR.
so the dual boot is not an issue, i use F8 to tell bios which disk to boot

consider yourself b1tch slapped !

ive done nothing, windows is used for nothing but email, prowsing the web and Wordperfect Office 2000.
virus scanner auto updates every week, and does a complete disk scan every 2 weeks, windows update runs automatically.

so why oh why did it chew up a system file ?

as for saying windowsXP has never crashed, and presumably never needed re-boting or re-installing... i dont believe you anymore.
you MUST be lieing. i cannot have such bad luck..

anyways....

my system..

processor....
Code:
processor : 0
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 6
model : 4
model name : AMD Athlon(tm) Processor
stepping : 4
cpu MHz : 1327.922
cache size : 256 KB
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 1
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 mmx fxsr syscall mmxext 3dnowext 3dnow
bogomips : 2637.82

ram 512 megs DDR 133mhz, (passed memcheck)

2 hard disks 6 gig each

1 dvd / cdrom
1 cdwriter

a floppy disk...

and i would dump the pci bus info.. but ive not compiled the PCI-utils package yet

but answer this...
why oh why oh why did windows feel the need to re-write the system file when all the pc is used for is playing on the internet ?

it MUST be the fault of an update gone wrng... or a virus.. despite the firewall, and all other recomended secirity crap i enabled.

im just pissed off that every1 keeps saying... windows is secure... windows is stable.... the BSODS are history.
what are they doing that im not ?

u'know... i have a 100mbit network card... under windows, it only runs at 10mbits... i assume this is because ive not installed the driver, and its running of a sh1tty microsoft generic driver...

i would update the driver... i have the proper full speed driver. i just dont have faith that windows will survive the install.

my windowsXP (fully uptodate) is about as stable as weapons grade uranium....

and everytime my dad / sister asks...
why do we have to re-install it..
why do we have to lose all our history and favorites link, and emails, and email address's and system settings, and photo's
why defragment to hard disk
why backup
why reboot,
why buy a new modem after upgrading to xp
why buy a new cd-writer software..

i try soooo hard not to say. because windows is a pile of cow poooo !

----------------------------------------------------------------------------- my 3rd rant

sooo.. i google about a bit...
and find...

IM NOT CURSED !
this is a very, very very common windows XP
FAULT !

search googoe for
"\system32\config\system corrupt"

and no1 reealy knows why it happens.

luckily, MS knows about this, an so gives you a spare
system file to replace the corrupt one.

but you have to do it in the uggliest command line environment.
all the commands are wrong...
there's no cp, ls or mv command.
and you have to use back slashes.. than fek the help command worked !

so... i follow MS advice and replace the corrupt system file
and yey... windows boots...

boots into a screen resolution that apears to be 200x300 pixesl.
the top half of my sceen is taken my the window border, and the bottom 3rd by the task bar.

so yep, it took the best part of 20 minutes to navigate to the contorl panel, and fix my resolution problem.

and it also seems, that my sound card, graphics card, printer, netowrk card, scanner, camera have uninstalled themselvs...

hands up... does any1 know why its a BAD IDEA to build an operating system with a central point of complete failure that is also prone to corruption ?

damnit... just when i though i was recovering... just when my only majot beef with xp was its monsterour uglyness... boom.. i fall back into rant mode !

pick any file on my linux machine... even the kernel if you like.
and i can guerantee i will have fixed the system completely without having to RE INSTALL EVERY FSCKING driver !

dont even bother replying.. i dont want help anymore.. i just feel like ranting !
however, feel free to agree with me.. or argue that windows is great.. and ill have anouther little rant later !

FSCK FSCK FSCK !

------------------------------------------------ end of rant.

ncase you cant be botherd to read all that.... so sum it up.
windows commonly corrupts a system file.
ms knows that, so kkps a backup version for you on the xp cd.
but installing it renders all your drivers useless... time to re-install all.

congratulations MICROSOFT.. only you could build an OS with a central point of failure that likes to corrupt itself every now and then.

BajaNick · 07-17-2004, 10:27 PM

I give it a 8, It would have been higher but there was no personal attack on bill gates, LOL

Joey.Dale · 07-17-2004, 11:12 PM

I give it a 7 because use didn't kick or punch or otherwise distory try computer

-Joey

darin3200 · 07-17-2004, 11:39 PM

6, everyone complains and about microsoft, or as the real rebels say, wind0zes

People should gets blogs for ranting

slackist · 07-17-2004, 11:45 PM

7.5

, very nice spouting off----stream of consciousness type rant but actual physical aggression toward the computer or at least nuking the WinXP CD in a microwave would have been a nice enhancement IMHO

qwijibow · 07-18-2004, 12:20 AM

ive shot my windows98 and 2k cd's with a cheap air riffel.... does that count ?

and there are dents in my pc-case.. but that was because of an un related matter.... dont it pi$$ you off when you cd-drive keeps making that noise that it makes when it re-reading the same thing over and over.... ?

frob23 · 07-18-2004, 05:30 AM

Ah, ranting... a lost artform. LOL... well I wouldn't call it lost... heck it is everywhere. ;-)

I had a wonderful rant a while back. It dealt with how Dell refused to sell me the computer I wanted without Windows on it. REFUSED.... I even told them I would pay the same price for the computer just don't put windows on it... they could pretend they did to MS for all I cared. Nope, it couldn't be done. So they send my new computer complete with Windows Me.

I was completely aware that I would never try to get my money back for Me... (just not my bag) so I decided to boot it up and take a peek before I installed FreeBSD. Everything boots, it starts playing this wonderful video about how great it is, how many features it has, and how stabl .... .... .... !!!!!!!! Right in the middle of the part about how stable it is the machine locks up, HARD. Real HARD... pull the plug from the wall hard. Yeah I restarted it with the FreeBSD cd in the drive and never looked back. Then I got online and wrote a huge rant (like 10 times the length of this) detailing all of this.

The best part was the irony about where the freeze happened. Ah, Windows Me... what the hell was MS smoking when they thought anyone would like that?

EDIT: Oh, I forgot to mention... the reason I chose Dell was because they were advertising about how you could get a computer from them with Linux on it. But the model I wanted didn't have that option. And they refused to work with me... I spent like three hours on the phone trying to get something worked out. The worst part... after all that, I bent over and took it like a bi^ch by buying the computer. I should have made a statement and taken my buisness elsewhere.

SciYro · 07-18-2004, 08:53 AM

frob23: its a shame you weren't video tapes this event,.... i would have loves to see it on TV

qwijibow: rant level, 8, rant interest(how in English do you say interesting but with the meaning more like interested... ah i know interest level (there has to be something better!!!, i sound like a banker now!)), anyways (bank) interest level, 10(not percent!, i only wish :'( )

very funny