windows\system32\config\system missing or corrupt

[kalimba]

Hi there -

I have windows xp home, with Avira and Malwarebytes protection.

My computer's been working great for many months, all my scans come out clean, no problems at all.

I shut my computer off this morning as I often do, uneventful.

This evening my computer wouldn't start in any mode, I only got the message

windows\system32\config\system missing or corrupt

Thankfully I have a recovery partition so I did a recovery, keeping my data files.

Still, as you know this is a bit of a pain.

Does anyone have any idea why this file would get corrupted??

Thanks !

[Jaxryley]

You could have a look around in the Event Viewer for any pointers to the problem?

[exile360]

Greetings kalimba

This particular error generally means that the registry is corrupted and and cannot be loaded, thus preventing the OS from booting. Please take a look at this Microsoft Knowledgebase article for more information.