Hi, Rick, If it is a registry problem, All in one tool by Shane would have fixed it. Have you tried mbr fix. You have reported that mbrfix not available. Please it is available when you log in thro the installation cd. The method is
Have the installation cd, and when prompt from cd comes enter to boot installation cd, and then when windows show start windows screen, select R for repairing and then enter 1 and password to go to c:\windows. Type FIXMBR to fix the unwanted entries other than the windows default mbr entries. Select yes if a warning message comes and then exit. Your problem would be getting solved. This even though seemed confusing will reset the mbr. Because the software downloaded might have included some entries to the mbr, making it vulnerabe for improper behaviour.
J, Shane said his program does not run in a stand-alone or boot up, his tool can not run from a boot-CD... it can only work within a windows system already running. “A Fault that should be fixed”
Currently, I have enabled the new drive; used minitool too copy; the old C: and D: to the new drive.
I re-installed Windows on a new drive to be sure system will even work, updated it back to VistaSP2;
Now “X Coping” in Overwrite mode the following directories back to the new hard drive;
Will try let startup-repair recover the BCD in startup repair mode; otherwise will copy the BCD from the new install drive to the new hard drive "hopefully, the BCD here will at least boot up"
\Drivers
\Inf
\System
\System32
\Winsxs "we should consider to point the operating system to one (winsxs folder), it will save 10G's"
“Note that we should rename the pending-file in the WINSXS folder”
“X copy” Users last or next try, "depends on whether we get a boot or not after the above"
Anything folders I missed?
One issue; we need a program that will run in standalone mode to open the registry. Then we can merge an old registry into the stand alone mode and restart from their should work ok... "I did not find one to do that"
I did not use this method; but it would have helped!
http://smallvoid.com/article/winnt-offline-registry-edit.html