Toshiba W-7 went dark

In message , Patrick
writes:
On 20/03/2018 20:43, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
[]
I take it they _are_ on an external drive, and that it's one that is
accessible if you've booted from the "Recovery Disc".
Yes, a cobbled together USB 3.5" HDD using old PSU for power

Ah, a _proper_ engineer! (What are you using for the USB-to-SATA part?)

Does the recovery disc have the ability to repair some boot errors,
_without_ a previously-made image?
Yes, on Boot asks for location for Keyboard, then scans machine looking
for OS's, Options for recovery (Restore Points, Backups on other
drives, etc,.


Sounds like a wonder disc! (At first, I wondered how you'd tell it where
the keyboard is without using the keyboard, then I realised you meant it
asks where _you_ are so as to map the keyboard keys properly.)

Would it fix corrupted partition tables (if that's what's wrong)?
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"He who will not reason is a bigot;
he who cannot is a fool;
he who dares not is a slave."
- Sir William Drummond

Above all things, use your mind.
Don't be that bigot, fool, or slave.

On 20/03/2018 21:16, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Patrick
writes:
On 20/03/2018 20:43, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
[]
I take it they _are_ on an external drive, and that it's one that is
accessible if you've booted from the "Recovery Disc".
Yes, a cobbled together USB 3.5" HDD using old PSU for power

Ah, a _proper_ engineer! (What are you using for the USB-to-SATA part?)

Does the recovery disc have the ability to repair some boot errors,
_without_ a previously-made image?
Yes, on Boot asks for location for Keyboard, then scans machine looking
for OS's, Options for recovery (Restore Points, Backups on other
drives, etc,.


Sounds like a wonder disc! (At first, I wondered how you'd tell it where
the keyboard is without using the keyboard, then I realised you meant it
asks where _you_ are so as to map the keyboard keys properly.)

Would it fix corrupted partition tables (if that's what's wrong)?

Dunno, but as I have understood things, if this W7 Recovery-Disk dosn't
fix things then use Macrium Recovery Disk instead/also. Apparently
between them they have been known to get things moving.

With this W7 Recovery-Disk all would be dependant on it being able to
see the Toshiba HDD, or havng a System Image somewhere.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/kbhdnghl5x...20.04.jpg?dl=0

After clicking 'Next' of above, there is the main options sceen.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/h8cl9zqdof...21.10.jpg?dl=0

Clicking on 'Startup Repair' goes to;
https://www.dropbox.com/s/cfvgue7zon...23.10.jpg?dl=0

Clicking on 'View diagnostic and repair details' goes to;
https://www.dropbox.com/s/sqdeisvnvq...23.43.jpg?dl=0

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Patrick
writes:
On 20/03/2018 20:26, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Patrick
writes:
On 20/03/2018 18:44, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
But let's see if he _needs_ a W7 install disc first. (Though I
suspect he is going to.)

If anybodys interested,
I can't vouch for its integrity, but I got myself a Copy of W7 Home
Premium from here;

https://softlay.net/operating-system...essional-full-
version-free-download-iso-32-64-bit.html
That filename suggests it's the professional version ...
Right hand column, after the advert, seventh item down
I use Pro verson, so only had that URL but it had the required item
(which HB apparently has on his good PC and Toshiba) should we be
wanting it

I just trimmed the above URL back to ...system/ and saw all the choices.
I have put a copy on Dropbox here;

https://www.dropbox.com/s/81yccsh9x4...e_premium_x64_
dvd.iso?dl=0
... and that filename suggests it's the home premium one (-:
It is.

I rather like the one that has all 6 (12 if you count both bitnesses)
versions. In fact, since you still need a valid key to activate, I can't
see any reason not to get that one, unless download time/total is very
significant. (Or don't keys work like that with the 12-version one?)

It's probably not 12 versions.

There could be a x86 disk with six versions.
There could be a x64 disk with six versions.

Starter, Home Basic, Home Premium, Pro, Ultimate
(I would be surprised if they put Enterprise on the
same disc, as they usually try to keep that separate
so the plebes don't get a copy.)

When you bought Full Retail software, at one time
the box came with two DVDs, an x86 one and a x64 one.
If you buy System Builder OEM kits, the disc only has the
one bitness (even though the license key works for
x86 or x64 install media). When I bought mine, I bought
a x64 version, then downloaded an x86 version for my
"collection" :-)

The MSDN ones could have the ei.cfg already removed
by Microsoft, so that when you boot with the intention
of installing, it will prompt for the version you want.

The current Win10 Release DVD has nine versions on it,
which as far as I know, is a new record for overlaid images
on a Microsoft DVD. And that file is also a relatively
large download, getting close to the DVD single-sided limit.
Each overlay only has a small cost in megabytes so
they can put in a good number of them over top of the
basic file set. Each OS version, is only a tiny deviation
from another version. This is why the AnyTime Upgrade could
finish in under ten minutes (sloggingly slow file linking,
but otherwise not a lot of new files).

And with a Hex editor, down near the end of the ISO file,
you can find an XML (text) table that documents all the versions
to be expected on that DVD image.

*******

In terms of authentication, if you decide you need one
of those ISO files, when it arrives, use your SHA1SUM program
to calculate the SHA1 checksum. Pop the checksum into Google,
and somewhere you'll find a list of checksums versus
product SKU. And that will help validate what you got.

I selected SHA1 for this, because Microsoft finally updated
their checksums on the MSDN site with SHA1 info, which is
a bit better for authentication purposes. I'd recommend something
stronger, except you're not going to find large lists of SHA256
values for them.

You can generate a SHA1 checksum with this.

http://md5deep.sourceforge.net/start-hashdeep.html

https://github.com/jessek/hashdeep/releases/tag/v4.4

# This download contains standalone EXE files. 32 bit and 64 bit.

https://github.com/jessek/hashdeep/r...d5deep-4.4.zip

# Unpack with WinZIP or 7ZIP.
# In this example, we make the program compute a checksum of itself.

hashdeep -c SHA1 hashdeep.exe

2e54041e3c5c040de911277e198b678444dcee42

The -j thread option works a treat in that program - but you
should only use large values of -j if you have an SSD. On a
hard drive, the best setting is "-j 1" so that the heads on
the disk aren't thrown around too violently. On an SSD you can
run -j 12 if you like. And the program can recursively checksum
the entire C: in no time at all that way (for SSDs).

Doing a search on virustotal against that SHA1 result, shows
a hashdeep being scanned here. Just to show one other thing you
can do with your calculated checksums - they can be used to
feed the "Search" function on virustotal.com. (DVDs are not
included as they're too big for the site. Only a select subset
of all DVDs in existence, are cataloged here.)

https://www.virustotal.com/#/file/8e...6dd6/detection

The MSDN ones used to have checksums right on the MSDN
download page. Then, access to the checksums was removed
for a time, because people Torrenting copies of the MSDN
DVDs, relied on the checksums for authentication. Microsoft
decided to "hide" them.

I don't know what the situation is today, in terms of
Google providing useful feedback based on a hash or checksum.
I bet you can still chase down info on what the file is,
what it's point of origin was (MSDN, main microsoft site,
digitalriver).

There might be as many as three different versions of
Windows 7 SP1 Home Premium, with a couple of later files
offering tiny corrections to the install process. I don't
think the OS files are different or newer. There's certainly
a ton of additional Windows Update downloads to be done to
a fresh install, to bring it up to date. The Convenience
Rollup is a start, but isn't the only file you would need.

Paul

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Char Jackson
writes:
[]
Yes, I know, but Paul consistently gives the advice to move to a browser
every time Heidoc comes up. I was getting the feeling that he either
hadn't seen the big blue Download buttons or he didn't know what they
were for. It turns out that he's concerned about coin mining. That
doesn't particularly bother me since an ISO download only takes a minute
or two but it may bother others. Considering what the program can offer,
I don't mind 90 seconds of cpu time.

You can download 4.x GB in 90 seconds! We're not all that lucky ... (-:

(Given that the Heidoc provides a useful service, I don't mind either,
even though it would take me longer than 90 seconds, provided it doesn't
impact the download time significantly.)

I choose to handle Heidoc with rubber gloves, so I don't
have to be staring at Task Manager all the time :-)

I don't know if any other organizations would agree to host
software of that kind or not. Since the tool points to legit
Microsoft downloads, there shouldn't be a problem. Microsoft
didn't send lawyers against the wsusoffline folks, because
in the end, their downloads are legit files coming from
Microsoft too.

Paul

On 20/03/2018 21:04, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Patrick
writes:
On 20/03/2018 20:26, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Patrick
writes:
On 20/03/2018 18:44, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
But let's see if he _needs_ a W7 install disc first. (Though I
suspectÂ* he is going to.)


If anybodys interested,
I can't vouch for its integrity, but I got myself a Copy of W7 Home
Premium from here;

https://softlay.net/operating-system...essional-full-
version-free-download-iso-32-64-bit.html

That filename suggests it's the professional version ...

Right hand column, after the advert, seventh item down
I use Pro verson, so only had that URL but it had the required item
(which HB apparently has on his good PC and Toshiba) should we be
wanting it

I just trimmed the above URL back to ...system/ and saw all the choices.
Jolly good, whatever gets you there



I have put a copy on Dropbox here;

https://www.dropbox.com/s/81yccsh9x4...e_premium_x64_
dvd.iso?dl=0
... and that filename suggests it's the home premium one (-:

It is.

I rather like the one that has all 6 (12 if you count both bitnesses)
versions. In fact, since you still need a valid key to activate, I can't
see any reason not to get that one, unless download time/total is very
significant. (Or don't keys work like that with the 12-version one?)

It did take quite a while to download, had to go through a few hoops to
finally get the file (they explain 'why' as you go along). It took even
longer to Upload it to Dropbox and download it again to other machine,
Ha ha, (a NightJob like!).

Dunno about the key, I use W7Pro and got the ISO elsewhere (dunno where)
and had to phone MS, pressing buttons (COA serial# thing), then
recording another collection of digits ,but it was allright cos you can
get a repeat by pressing '#'.

Here's my collection of W7 Pro ISO's (not sure where I got them), it may
ring a bell to someone by the format of names;
https://www.dropbox.com/s/61in51ui1v...16.55.png?dl=0

On 20/03/2018 11:14, Mike Easter wrote:

Later he got fatdog to boot:

Then I must apologise for sowing this thread with an even greater level
of confusion than that which caused me to miss that post!

If he gets to a command prompt, then he might care to try giving the
command (in all that follows, the precededing sudo may not be required,
it would be in Ubuntu, but I don't know about this distro that he's using):
sudo lilo --helpEnter

If he gets a page of help, rather than a terse message similar to ...
lilo not found
.... then the command ...
sudo lilo -M device mbrEnter
.... will fix the MBR on his hard disk. But first we would have to help
him find out what to use for device. As it's fairly recent, it's
likely to be /dev/sda, making the command ...
sudo lilo -M /dev/sda mbrEnter
.... but again, I don't know the distro, so others may be able to give
better advice as to how to determine the hard disk's device designation.

On Tue, 20 Mar 2018 20:57:38 +0000, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:

In message , Char Jackson
writes:
[]
Yes, I know, but Paul consistently gives the advice to move to a browser
every time Heidoc comes up. I was getting the feeling that he either
hadn't seen the big blue Download buttons or he didn't know what they
were for. It turns out that he's concerned about coin mining. That
doesn't particularly bother me since an ISO download only takes a minute
or two but it may bother others. Considering what the program can offer,
I don't mind 90 seconds of cpu time.

You can download 4.x GB in 90 seconds! We're not all that lucky ... (-:

To be fair, most of the ISO's aren't 4GB. Win 8 and 10 are about that
size, but Win 7 is about 3GB and the Office stuff is less than a Gig.

--

Char Jackson

On Tue, 20 Mar 2018 18:08:15 -0400, Paul wrote:

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
I rather like the one that has all 6 (12 if you count both bitnesses)
versions. In fact, since you still need a valid key to activate, I can't
see any reason not to get that one, unless download time/total is very
significant. (Or don't keys work like that with the 12-version one?)

It's probably not 12 versions.

There could be a x86 disk with six versions.
There could be a x64 disk with six versions.

Starter, Home Basic, Home Premium, Pro, Ultimate
(I would be surprised if they put Enterprise on the
same disc, as they usually try to keep that separate
so the plebes don't get a copy.)

Right, Enterprise is never included.

When you bought Full Retail software, at one time
the box came with two DVDs, an x86 one and a x64 one.
If you buy System Builder OEM kits, the disc only has the
one bitness (even though the license key works for
x86 or x64 install media).

The license also works for any language, in case that's important.

The MSDN ones could have the ei.cfg already removed
by Microsoft, so that when you boot with the intention
of installing, it will prompt for the version you want.

If not, it's drop dead easy to use the ei.cfg removal tool for people
who don't want to get their hands dirty. Heidoc has a copy for download.

In terms of authentication, if you decide you need one
of those ISO files, when it arrives, use your SHA1SUM program
to calculate the SHA1 checksum. Pop the checksum into Google,
and somewhere you'll find a list of checksums versus
product SKU. And that will help validate what you got.

I would start with the Heidoc site. They maintain cleanly formatted
lists of SHA1 and MD5 checksums for everything that Digital River
hosted, as well as everything that the Heidoc app will pull down. Why
trust them? I don't know, but I've checked about 15-20 ISOs against
other sources and they all matched what Heidoc says they should be.

If you trust the source, i.e., Microsoft or Digital River when they were
still around, you really don't need any better checksum than either SHA1
or MD5. You aren't looking for tampering. You're only looking for signs
of corruption, such as during the download. Even MD5 is good enough for
that.

--

Char Jackson

On 20/03/2018 23:54, Char Jackson wrote:
If you trust the source, i.e., Microsoft or Digital River when they were
still around,
I'm not sure I know what I'm talking about but, is not this 'Digital River';
http://mirror.digitalriver.info/



you really don't need any better checksum than either SHA1
or MD5. You aren't looking for tampering. You're only looking for signs
of corruption, such as during the download. Even MD5 is good enough for
that.

On Wed, 21 Mar 2018 00:27:16 +0000, Patrick
wrote:

On 20/03/2018 23:54, Char Jackson wrote:
If you trust the source, i.e., Microsoft or Digital River when they were
still around,
I'm not sure I know what I'm talking about but, is not this 'Digital River';
http://mirror.digitalriver.info/

No, Digital River is a content distribution entity where you used to be
able to download ISO files for various Windows versions, among other
things.

What you have above is a series of torrent links, which is quite another
thing entirely. Those torrents may or may not lead to valid Windows
ISOs. I don't plan to try them since I already have multiple copies of
everything.

--

Char Jackson

"J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote in message
...
In message , HB writes:
[]
I never thought to and now it's wiped clean and doing a backup as I type

What's doing a "backup"?

It doesn't say. It just says " Backup in progress." After removing
everything off the Seagate I did a backup, through it's "right
click/properties/tools (tab)" and it did a "Windows Image backup."
There's the date followed by 6 numbers. I don't know if my news server
allows images to be sent to Usenet.


So it's probably "the Windows backup" that's doing - something.

Yes.

....... and probably
a CD that you boot from, or instructions on how to make one, if a
machine
it has imaged fails to boot.

What says?

"Create A System Image" and "Create a Repair disc". But that's from
Windows not SG. The window says the "System Image" copies everything
including the OS and can be reinstalled. Of course it doesn't say how.
It's

Yes, there is some sort of backup facility built into Windows itself; I'd
forgotten about that. However, to reinstall from the image it makes, you
need to be able to boot _something_ if Windows won't boot.

No info if windows don't boot using the disk. I made one of those System
Repair disks on this healthy problem free W-7 computer and tried to boot the
Toshiba with it. The Toshiba saw the rescue CD,said "press any key to boot
from CD or DVD" - but then gave me the same "Disk read error occurred"
error.

It's a
while since I looked at Windows' own imaging system, but I _think_ you
need to both "Create A System Image" (which I presume it does on an
external HD, or a tediously large number of DVDs), AND "Create a Repair
Disc" (which I presume is a DVD), then if the system falls over, you boot
from the Repair Disc, and use that to restore the Image from wherever
you've put it - either to the existing HD if it's just been corrupted, or
to a new HD if the existing one has failed. In other words, the same idea
as Macrium, but Macrium makes it much easier (I think the Windows one
might be a command-mode thing).

I don't know since these so called Repair disks didn't work when the is same
black-screen-of-death happened to the XP and Vista computers in the past.

OK, so on your external 500G Seagate, you could make three images of that
(using Macrium - I don't know about the basic Windows method), or one or
two plus one or two of the Toshiba, assuming we ever get that back working
again.

Honestly, I've given up hope. It can run software like Linux from the DVD
drive but as far as ever getting Windows to load - I can't see how.

Go on,
buy one of them; they're cheap enough, and always useful. It's possible
you're going to need to buy the laptop a replacement HD anyway, so you
could combine the orders.

I can't see what use Linux is since the Toshiba runs it just fine from the
DVD. What useful info do we get from that? It's like W running OE6 from a
thumbdrive. It not just the cost of a new HD but then paying for the W OS to
load on it. There is no existing OS CD for the Toshiba.

Give me the name of that docking thing again. Do you know who makes it?
I'll call around and see if someone local carries it. I also have to make
sure it has the inserts for the 2 flat cables from the Toshiba's HD. I also
want to know what a MS Windows OS disk costs these days. I only once had to
buy a MS W95 disk when my first custom made PC bit the dust. It turned out
the guy from work who made it was illegally installing W95 on all the PCs
made. I also had to pay a tech to install the new HD and get the legal copy
on it. I wish I could have W-7 installed on it.


She's wealthy and has no kids or grandkids. No one to spend it on but
herself. Everything she has is top of the line. Must be nice.

Ah, I thought it was yours, since your daughter plays games on it.

A bit of confusion here. It is mine now. My elderly Aunt gave us the
Toshiba when she replaced it with something newer faster and better. I don't
know why because she seldom uses a computer. My youngest daughter had her
games and her email account on it. Because it was slow it wasn't the most
popular PC in the house.


She bought it somewere up in Atlanta GA were she lived back then.

By "it", I presume you mean the computer, rather than a separate box
labelled "Windows 7" with a CD or two in it. In other words, the Windows
was bought as part of the computer, already pre-installed.

Yes. That's how PCs are sold here now. The OS is already on the HD, a copy
of it in a seperate petition as I understand it. You have to make your own
DVD and Repair Disks. My aunt never did that, nor did I when I got it from
her. For some reason it never crossed my mind. We used to get the DVD with
the OS on it with a new PC. The only time I know of when someone buys the OS
disk itself is if the PC is custom made at home. At this time I'm not sure
if the DVD we make, and only 1 copy is allowed, would work on a new HD, a
replacement for one that failed.


I'm not sure where you'd use the Toshiba number(s): if you're very
lucky,
it might be possible to download something from the Toshiba website
using
them. I've no idea if Toshiba offer anything like that.

I can check.

Any luck?

Before I order a CD of the OS for the Toshiba I want to know if the HD is
bad. I also have to price HDs. Laptops are not that expensive anymore. It
may not be worth it to put a lot of cash into the Toshiba if I could buy a
new laptop for a few bucks more.

"J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote in message
...
In message , HB writes:

What and where is this to be found? What was I to do with it? It loaded
Linux from the DVD. There was nothing like that on the screen. Was there

There is: you described below "the few icons", so Linux fatdog has loaded,
and got as far as a graphical interface. One of them - in the taskbar
(using the Windows term for it) - will start Terminal, which is
Linux-speak for Command Prompt. It's the one that looks like a little
black rectangle with a white "_" in it. I don't know if you single-click
or double-click on it.

Found it. It's a blank black window. Since I know zero about Linux I don't
know how to get that info to show.


Failing all else, can you post (this means upload somewhere, and tell us
where - you can't attach here) a shot of the screen when Linux has
finished booting, taken with your ancient digital camera? Doesn't matter
if it's a bit blurry, we should be able to figure out what's where.

This is the best the old camera can do.

https://postimg.org/gallery/38afbakly/


supposed to be? Or how do I bring up that screen for that information? I
don't know what "Terminal, smartctl -a /dev/sda" is or what it means.

Terminal is what the window is called; smartctl -a /dev/sda (followed by
return) is what you type into it once you've opened it.

Doid that is it says, "Smartctl not found."

I added "return" and some other info came up. White text on the black
background. See images online.

https://postimg.org/gallery/38afbakly/


What does this have to do with Linux? This looks like a simpler OS than
Windows. There are no graphs like these. I didn't see anything like there
while it was loading. I don't understand.....

No, any more than you'd see them while Windows is loading; you have to run
things to generate them. And Paul was telling you where to get the things
to run. But that's a bit down the line: if we're going to go the Linux
route, let's just get a terminal up, and run smartctl (which apparently is
included in fatdog Linux) in it first, to see if there's any point in
continuing to work with this hard drive.

See the images at the site posted above. Nothing like the image you
showed.

"Patrick" wrote in message
news
On 20/03/2018 07:59, HB wrote:
There is nothing like that to be seen. It says FATDOG in the center of
the
screen with the few icons along the left hand side and bottom. I'm
looking
at it now. It's running in RAM, not from the HD.

The Icons along the bottom, do you not see the Icon that looks like '_'
and is pointed to by an arrow drawn by Paul that says 'Terminal'? if you
do then click-it.

Found it - No image shows after typing in some kind of code.

https://postimg.org/gallery/38afbakly/

"Paul" wrote in message
news
J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Java Jive
..

You may be right. Paul has, however, posted a screenshot that shows a
Linux desktop, with arrows etc. drawn on to show which is the
Terminal-launching icon, so I hope HB has seen that image by now.

There is the Terminal button, at the bottom of the screen.

I had no way to know a Terminal button was the Command window. This is
what I get when I typed that code info in the "terminal."
https://postimg.org/gallery/38afbakly/ Ignore the pics of the sticker on
the back of the PC.

Fatdog runs from the DVD on the Toshiba, not the HD, if that makes a
difference.

"Paul" wrote in message
news
Java Jive wrote:
a screenshot

But he hasn't got a GUI!

TBH with you, I have *no idea* what's on his screen.
Not a clue.

https://postimg.org/gallery/38afbakly/

The Fatdog screen comes up with the icons on the side and bottom, dog in the
center, but not that image after I type in the code in the command/terminal
window. Maybe because it runs from the DVD and is not installed on the HD.


I thought something booted, but what do I know.

Yes, Fatdog booted and runs from the DVD drive, it can't be installed on the
HD.


Right now, I can't even be sure he looked at the pictures I posted.

I have. I can't them to show in the Command/Terminal window.


I'm not picking up signals, that we're in sync at all.

He's doing something, but what ? I've got no
signal to work with.




Paul