Can't repair or clean install Vista.

I'm at my wits end.

Today my computer crashed while playing Empire: Total war, and upon restarting it ran a disc check on its own.

It moved around and repaired some things (named $130 and such) and said at the end only 4kb of data was in bad sectors. I thought nothing of it and the computer finished booting to desktop as normal.

I then went to click"Computer" to check something on my C: drive and I got the error : Explorer.exe class not registered.



So I go snooping around the internet (one of the few things that does still work).

Tried typing "regsvr32 urlmon.dll" in run and command prompt, says it isn't found and does nothing.

Used command prompt to scan my files to find out what was damaged or missing, and it says that some of them could not be repaired, and I should refer to a certain log inorder to find out what couldn't be fixed. Problem is that log is on the C drive and I cannot access it, obviously.

I put in my Vista disc and told it to install inorder to try to fix it, and it tells me urlmon.dll not found, and then winsetup.dll error 0x7E with no other numbers or letters in the code.

So finally I resign myself to do a clean install of Vista and be done with it.

So I assign the dvd to be first in boot order and it loads up the files and whatnot.....but then it just goes to the blueish/greenish swirly looking vista background that you see when your system is starting up, right before the desktop. And sits there, no options show up, nothing to click. Nothing.

Now I have no idea what to do, and am starting to panic. As far as I know I have no viruses/spyware/malware, etc on my computer. And I've run check disc and it either finds nothing wrong, or very very little wrong (the 4kb of data in bad sectors). I take good care of my computer, running spybot/c cleaner/ defragging , windows / drivers up to date, etc. I just don't know what to do as nothing I've tried is working.

Any help at all is appreciated.

I would try putting your boot order back the way it was and try to boot normally.
If that doesn't work try booting in Safe Mode.

Also if you get it to come up, take a loot at this site:

How to Replace Urlmon.dll | eHow.com

Thanks for the response.

I went to the link and was able to download the urlmon.dll. As things are now every aspect of my computer works as normal, anything that isn't on the C drive can be used (I have a second hard drive) , I can even use Internet Explorer, I just cannot access alot of things on the C drive itself.

Anyhow. I tried to extract the download to the System32 folder, and then told it to replace all, and it won't let me, saying it cannot replace urlmon.dll and access is denied.....Which is funny because I'm logged in as Admin.

Can't use command prompt to bring up the folder and drag and drop manually, because it gives me the good old "class not registered".

Guess I'll try in safe mode.

Progress!

So when I first tried to extract the freshly downloaded urlmon.dll to the System32 folder, I used WinRAR. That's when I was told I couldn't etc. So I followed the read me that came with the thing and it said to use ExpressZip. So I download Ezip and then also go into Safe Mode.

For whatever reason once I did this I was able to actually access the System32 folder through EZip itself, and at that point I drug the newly downloaded urlmon.dll into the folder and replaced the existing one (guess it wasn't missing, must have just been corrupted) it seemed to accept me doing this and I got no further messages. So I restarted my computer.

I still cannot click "Computer" as it's still giving me the same error, so I booted up the Vista install disc and what do you know, the cannot find urlmon.dll error was gone!

But.......I still got the winsetup.dll error, but this time with a different error code, not 0x7E this time, but instead winsetup.dll error 0xC1.

So I still can't try to repair Vista from the disc.

Hmm, after doing some research it seems that error code means there is something wrong with the DVD drive or the DVD itself.

Upon inspection there is a small (but worrying enough looking) scuff mark on the bottom of my disc.

I wonder if this is what is causing so many of my issues.

Problem is the disc is OEM, bought it from Newegg when I built this computer 2 years ago.

Anyone think this is probably the problem at this point? Any way of working around this or getting a replacement disc or something?

As long as you use your product key , you can use any Vista installation disc - borrow one from a friend, etc.

It doesn't matter what Edition it says on the dvd ( e.g. Home Premium, Business ). They are all the same.

In fact if you find you want to do a clean wipe and install, you can install with no product key in evaluation mode. See if it works, then activate it if everything seems cool after a couple of days. If you look around you can find step by step guides how to install Vista for evaluation. It's legal. MS put it there so you can try before you buy.

Thanks guys. :D