Chunk-Star

Don't drink, don't smoke, don't fuck -- fuck you!
Straight-edge kids... fuck you!

Listen to what happened. It's a computer thing, but it's crazy. I was fixing my sister's computer -- something I have to do every few months because she's always installing viruses and spyware and things like that. Usually it just means running AdAware and such, but this time I thought I'd install Windows XP Service Pack 2 in the hope that all the new security fixes would let me off the hook for this sort of thing in the future.

Okay, so I get the laptop home and plug it into my network and it starts downloading SP2 automatically, which is nice. So that takes a while, and then it's 'validating' the download or some shit, so I go and start making some food. Well, I get back, and the laptop has turned itself off. This is where the crazy stuff begins. Guys, just so you know, I know next to nothing about any of this Windows shit, so keep it mind I am just guessing how to do all this stuff as I'm doing it.

Me: Oh, maybe SP2 needed to restart the laptop but it got turned off by accident. (Turns laptop back on.)

Laptop: (Begins to boot into Windows, then, accompanied by Blue Screen of Death) PROCESS1_INITIALIZATION_FAILED.

Me: Hmmm... the laptop is awfully hot. Maybe some internal motherboard sensor is freaking out. (Waits 10 minutes. Starts laptop up again.)

Laptop: PROCESS1_INITIALIZATION_FAILED.

Me: Gee, this looks bad. Let me search the Internet on my other computer to see what this means.

Internet: (Thinks for a while.) You are fucked. Format your hard disk and re-install Windows XP.

Me: Ack! No, I can't do that! This is my sister's laptop -- it's got all her MP3s on it and she needs it to write a paper for school tomorrow night! There's gotta be something I can do... oh, I know, I'll boot off a Windows XP CD and try to check the hard disk for errors. (Burns a copy of Windows XP Professional, Yale Academic Edition, and boots off of it.)

Laptop, via Windows XP CD: Do you want to start the Recovery Console?

Me: Ooh, that sounds good. Yeah!

Laptop: What's the Administrator password?

Me: Oh, fuck, I don't know. Hang on. (Makes a phone call to parents' house.) Hey, sister, what is the Administrator password?

Sister: There is no Administrator password!

Me: Okay, thanks. (Hangs up. Tries the CD-boot thing again.)

Laptop: What's the Administrator password?

Me: Ah, fuck.

Internet: Excuse me, but have you heard about these special programs you can use to reset Windows XP Administrator passwords? You burn them onto a CD and then you boot off the CD and then you can reset the password. Here, try this one.

Me: Oh, okay, thanks. (Burns the program onto a CD and boots the laptop off of it.)

Laptop, via Linux NTFS CD: Hey, you wanna try to reset the Administrator password?

Me: Yeah!

Laptop: Sorry, your registry files are corrupt! Peace!

Internet: Okay, that one didn't work out so well. You wanna try again with this one?

Me: Well... alright. (Burns the program onto a CD and boots the laptop off of it.)

Laptop, via Linux NTFS CD v2: Hey, you wanna try to reset the Administrator password?

Me: Yeah!

Laptop: Sorry, your registry files are corrupt! Peace! Oh, wait -- you wanna try to change the settings for the Recovery Console so it doesn't need the Administrator password?

Me: Uh... yeah, that sounds good. Let's do it. (Does it. Puts the Windows XP Boot CD back in the drive and reboots.)

Laptop: Okay, here's the Recovery Console. As you can see, it's a lot like DOS. You can type stuff and run a few programs.

Me: Well, I'm pretty sure this is all due to some kind of filesystem problem. Laptop, can we check the disk for errors?

Laptop: Sure. (Thinks for a while.) The disk is fine.

Me: Hmmm... what should we do now? Internet, any ideas?

Internet: Well, the registry, the giant configuration file for Windows, is divided into two big pieces. One's called SOFTWARE and has settings for installed programs; the other one's called SYSTEM and has all the settings for the hardware. There are backups of both files in "C:\WINDOWS\REPAIR."

Me: Okay, let's replace the SOFTWARE file with the backup one.

Laptop: PROCESS1_INITIALIZATION_FAILURE.

Me: That didn't work. Let's try replacing the SYSTEM file with the backup.

Laptop: (Reboots ad infinitum.)

Me: That's not good either. Well, I'm out of ideas again.

Internet: Excuse me, but I just found something that Microsoft's saying that might be helpful. Microsoft?

Microsoft: Yes, thanks, hmmm... well, you see, if you've got a bad Service Pack 2 installation, you can roll it back using the Recovery Console by typing 'batch spuninst.txt'.

Me: Okay, I'll try that. (Does. It works. The laptop is now back in the state it was in before the trouble started -- still with several viruses and spyware programs. It is 2:30 AM.)

And... scene.