Fixing /windows/system32/config/system alternative

Question

Recently I got this screen on boot that says /windows/system32/config/system is missing; use Windows CD to repair:

(this is Windows XP, btw) so I tried with the CD, but I got this BSOD:

because of bad sectors. I fixed them somehow from lubintu, but now the Windows installation CD doesn't offer me the repair option, but just to format the partition. Is there any way to fix this error without wiping the partition?

P.S. System restore wasn't enabled, so it won't work that way.

Answer 1

From memory - and the MS docs back it up, there should be a backup copy of that and other files under copy c:\windows\repair\system - if you can boot into and access the drive from lubuntu, you can use it to back up, then replace the files.

That said, from your question "because of bad sectors." and the fact it is running XP indicates an older machine. This working would at best be a short term fix. You really ought to consider backing up anything important since you might suffer from anything from disk failures to unrelated, immediate, age related hardware failures.