nootsponge
New member
- May 17, 2025
- 3
This isn't exclusively for Windows 11 but it's very general so I didn't want to put it in the actual Windows Update forum. I'm a new user here and I work for Geek Squad (I know the reputation of some Geek Squad locations isn't the greatest but I'm trying to reverse that stigma...). A large majority of my job is attempting to recover Windows installations that will not boot for one reason or another. Most of the time it is related to some important corrupted files. I much prefer fixing the problem without data loss/reinstalling the OS from scratch, but most of the time since the OS doesn't boot I'm limited to very few options. My main goal in starting this discussion is to get some insight on how I might go about recovering said offline Windows installations. Let me give an example to help:
I have attempted to read the DISM.log to gather the missing/corrupted packages, load them onto a USB, and use that as a "source" for DISM but that has never worked for me for one reason or another (possibly format, not accepting .wim or individual packages). And the other day I ended up downloading an MSU file and attempting to re-add the package that was missing, but then ran into another issue of DISM not being able to read the unattend.xml. I can only assume these issue stem from the OS being offline and not being able to access certain resources it needs to fully recover itself. What options do I have to repair the OS from an offline state considering these circumstances?
I'm not much for one to join forums but this seems like a very knowledgeable community, and I appreciate any insight you all may have!
- Client brings in their PC because it is not booting.
- Device is bootlooping, manage to get into the recovery environment.
- Run the typical stack: chkdsk, sfc, dism.
- DISM detects component store corruption but source files cannot be found.
I have attempted to read the DISM.log to gather the missing/corrupted packages, load them onto a USB, and use that as a "source" for DISM but that has never worked for me for one reason or another (possibly format, not accepting .wim or individual packages). And the other day I ended up downloading an MSU file and attempting to re-add the package that was missing, but then ran into another issue of DISM not being able to read the unattend.xml. I can only assume these issue stem from the OS being offline and not being able to access certain resources it needs to fully recover itself. What options do I have to repair the OS from an offline state considering these circumstances?
I'm not much for one to join forums but this seems like a very knowledgeable community, and I appreciate any insight you all may have!