R61 Error on Factory Restore

[stargate77]

Hi,

I opted to do a full factory retore on an R61 (8943-DSG), but nearing completion the following error message was displayed:

Windows could not parse or process unattend answer file [C:\Windows\panther\unattend.xml] for pass [auditUser]. The settings specified in the answer file cannot be applied. The error was detected while processing settings for component [Microsoft-Windows-Deployment]

The only option was to click on the OK button. The computer then restarted, got to the Welcome screen, and then displayed the following:

Windows could not complete the installation. To install Windows on this computer, restart the installation.

Restarting the installation resulted in the same set of messages.

If anyone can offer any advice it would be much appreciated.

Thank you.

[andyP Community SuperMod]

Hi stargate77, welcome to the forum,

once you start the recovery process and it's doing it's thing don't watch it, go off and do something else for about 90 minutes; during the recovery process it's possible that you see some error messages, but if you observe the hard drive activity indicator you'll see that things are still happening.

My guess is that you've preemptively reacted to one of the error messages and that's why you're seeing the "could not complete install" message.  The first time you should need to take any action after the recovery process has started and completed is to enter your language and location when Windows starts properly for the first time.

If the error message is displaying after 2 hours then something isn't quite right.

[stargate77]

Hi Andy,

Many thanks for your response.

You were right in as much as the next time that I looked at the computer it had arrived at the Adminstrator login screen with a message saying that the Adminstrator was locked out. The only option was to click on Switch User but as I had never had the opportunity to set up any other users I was no better off. I did try logging in as Guest with no password but it would not accept it. The only other option was to switch off.

When powered up again, the computer got to the Welcome screen and diplayed the same message as before, i.e. Windows cannot be installed, etc. Clicking on OK the computer then arrived at the desktop screen with a few large icons as if the graphics driver hadn't been installed properly. A message window flashed up, headed cmd.exe, with a message saying that the application failed to initialise. There was no option to respond or do anything before the computer logged off and restarted. Upon restarting this latter series of events was repeated before the computer then logged off again and restarted. It continued to go round in this loop until I forced the machine to switch off.

Regards ... Dave

[andyP Community SuperMod]

Dave,

did you start the recovery process from the beginning again?  If not you need to otherwise you are doomed to have problems of one kind or the other.

[stargate77]

Hi Andy,

Apologies for the delay in replying. In answer to your question, yes, I did start the recovery process right from the very beginning again.

Regards ... Dave

[andyP Community SuperMod]

And how long had the recovery been running? 

Like I previously stated it will take a while and you should ignore all error messages untill it requests input for country & keyboard etc. in other words; do not touch.  If after 2 hours you do not see ththe field to input country & keyboard etc. then something isn't right.

[stargate77]

Andy,

I had another go today, starting the factory restore right from the very beginning, but after several hours all I was witnessing was the same set of errors as previously described.

Dave

[andyP Community SuperMod]

Hi Dave,

that's not what I wanted to read somethings not right and it's probably a hardware failure somewhere. In such situations I always test the hard drive itself first.  As you seem to have access to another comuter could download the CD image of Hitachi's Drive Fitness Test and then burn the iso image to CD, boot your system from it and let it check your drive.

We don't know your reasons for opting to run a recovery, but if it was system instability this could have been caused by hard drive problems.

[andrewp]

hi there

i've got exactly the same problem trying to complete a factory restore on my r61i.

the reason for doing it was that the laptop was pretty slow and thought that a fresh install would make it a little faster. so there appears to be no problems.

i unfortunately when i first started to install it paid attention to the pop ups and did what it asked - click to restart, etc. seems like i should have left it alone.

it's now on a loop, that if i leave it alone to install it gets to a position where the error message that windows could not parse or process unattend answer file... sticks and doesn't do anything else even it's it's left for a period of time - couple of hours.

any tips would be appreciated!

[stargate77]

Andy,

I ran the DFT as advised, which passed the HDD as OK.

The reason that a Full Factory Restore was undertaken was that the laptop was seen to be sluggish, and it was thought that this might be an easy option in resolving the issue. No other problems have been associated with this laptop.

Dave