Stop: C000021a fatal system error

[kalibali04]

Hello, I installed an anti virus program calle dAvast on my Gateway laptop (running Windows XP). It said that it had to shut down the computer to remove some viruses, so I clicked OK, and when I tried to turn it back on, I got the following message:

Stop: Coooo21a {Fatal System Error}

The session manager initialization system process terminated unexpectatly with a status of 0xc0000034 (0x00000000) (0x00000000)

The system has been shut down.

I am not that tech savy, but I am decent...I have no idea what to do.

Any assitance in as simple English as possible would be awesome

Thanks!

[J-Roc]

would it start up again?

[kalibali04]

the computer itself turns on, and goes through the boot screen that it should when turning on correctly (the one that says Windows Home XP)...but then it goes to the blue screen with the fatal system error message.

[.Maleficus.]

Sounds like an effed up registry. That's what I gather from Google anyways.

I'd just try doing a Repair install of Windows. I've done it a few times to fix bad problems, and it works pretty good.

[kalibali04]

Thanks, how do I do that? I have a system restore disk...but it says I lose everything. If I do a repair, will I still have my files? If so, how do I go about doing that?
Thanks so much!!

[.Maleficus.]

It's on option during install. Was this computer an OEM machine? (Dell, eMachines, whatever) If it is, I'm not sure that it has the feature, but if it's a custom-built with straight XP disks, all you do is pop in the disk and when prompted choose "R" for Repair.

And yep, it'll keep your files and keep everything as close to as how you left it that it can.

[doug91]

Sounds like bad news my man. We'd be able to deal with this problem pretty easily if you could actually use the computer. Most likely you had a very intense virus on your system. It could have embedded itself into a system file and then the antivirus promptly removed that system file.

Insert that system restore/boot disk. It is all you can do. Unfortunately you probably will end up loosing a lot. Depending on the disk and age of the machine it might cleanly install the OS or just restore XP to a previous system restore point.

[kalibali04]

I put in the System Restore Disk and this is what I saw:
System Rostore Menu / WINDOWS XP

1. Restore Windows XP
2. Boot to Command Prompt From CD-ROM

So, I selecetd 2 and then it said:
A:\> and i typed in R but it said it's a bad command of file name.

Any suggestions? I'd like to attempt to repair the computer without loosing everything if that's possible.

Thanks so much!!

It's on option during install. Was this computer an OEM machine? (Dell, eMachines, whatever) If it is, I'm not sure that it has the feature, but if it's a custom-built with straight XP disks, all you do is pop in the disk and when prompted choose "R" for Repair.

And yep, it'll keep your files and keep everything as close to as how you left it that it can.

[HackSore]

Try running chkdsk before repairing, you might not have any luck, but its worth a try.

boot into command prompt, type C:\ and hit enter, then type chkdsk /r.

It will scan the drive for errors and fix any it can.

[kalibali04]

The computer won't boot at all. I just get the main screen that should show up, then it turns blue before anything loads. Is there a way to get to teh command prompt without having to boot? I tried to "Boot into Safe Mode with Command Prompt," but since it won't boot anywhere, that doesn't work.
Thanks!!