When attempting to create a restore point manually, an error is displayed saying a restore point could not be created "This service cannot be started in Safe Mode (0x8007043C)". However, the system is not in safe mode. System Restore says no restore points exist on the system. The system is about two weeks old, a Dell Inspiron 580 Intel i5-750 with Win 7 64-bit Home Prem. Dell support says to re-install, but that would mean repeating many days of work installing apps, etc. Surely there is a way to identify the problem. msconfig is set for Normal start-up. Windows Defender, Symantec online virus scan both return no problem. 'sfc /scannow' is happy. McAfee came with the machine but was deleted. I tried deleting some apps that might be causing problems (eg., DaemonTools Lite, Oracle VirtualBox) but no luck. Tried creating a new admin user and it got the same error. The Event log shows no Error or Warning messages, and no Info messags seem relevant. Volume Shadow Service is starting. I'd be grateful for any suggestions on what to try next. If you'd like more info about the system, pls ask.

If the computer is not in Safe Mode it is a possibility that the startup is set to Selective Startup instead of Normal startup. Let us cross check this and get the computer to Normal Startup. We can also run a virus scan to check any infections and verify if the necessary services are set to Automatic. Follow the three listed methods below and check. Method 1. Here is how: 1. Click Start, type msconfig.exe in the Start Search box, and then press ENTER. 2. If you are prompted for an administrator password or for confirmation, type your password, or click Continue. On the General tab, click the Normal Startup option, and then click OK. 3. When you are prompted to restart the computer, click Restart. http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Using-System-Configuration Method 2. If the issue still exists let us check if the necessary services are set to Automatic: Here is how: 1. Open Administrative Tools by clicking the Start button, and then clicking Control Panel. In the search box, type administrative tools, and then click Administrative Tools. 2. Double-click Services. If you're prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation. 3. In the Services dialog box, click Volume Shadow Copy (you might need to scroll to find it; the entries are in alphabetical order). 4. Note the status of the selection (the status appears in the third column). If it shows Stopped, right-click Volume Shadow Copy, and then click Start and set it to Automatic. 5. Repeat the steps for "Windows Installer" service as well. 9. Close the Services dialog box, and then check. Method 3. If you suspect any virus activity I would strongly recommend you to run the Virus Scan. I would recommend you to run online Virus Scan to remove any infections, if present. Follow the link below to run the free online scan: http://onecare.live.com/site/en-us/default.htm The following thread discusses about removing viruses and malware online: http://social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vistasecurity/thread/ba80504b-61f1-4d71-960f-b561798b7b42 Reference: http://social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/w7repair/thread/cb21fa82-b772-4238-868d-18ec25dee7d4 This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties or guarantees , and confers no rights.

Hi Mr. x. I tried what you suggested (I had already tried those things, and tried them again just now) but it had no effect on the problem. Method 1: msconfig.exe showed 'Normal start-up' checked (so no joy there). Method 2: VSS is 'automatic' (the event log shows that it starts OK). 'Installer' was 'manual' so I changed it to 'automatic', but that had no effect. Method 3: Ran a virus check, Windows Defender, and sfc. No problems found. Manual creation of a restore point still fails with the indicated error.

Try to run system restore from the recovery environment.

Cesabane, thanks for your idea. I tried F8, System Repair, to get into the recovery environment, selected System Restore, and got the same thing as in the normal environment: "No restore points have been created on your computer's system drive". The system is configured for system restore on C (the system drive) with 5% disk allocated, but manual create (and automatic creates) of restore points fails.

Try to allocate more disk space and check if you are able to create restore points. Please also disable your antivirus when you will perform a such task. This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties or guarantees , and confers no rights.

Already tried that -- also tried turning it on and off, set to zero, different partitions, etc. The error msg implies it's failing some start-up test -- if the msg is accurate, some setting or data makes it incorrectly think the system is in safe mode.

i'd like to take a look at that personally if you would allow me. I mean doing a screen sharing session.

Thanks Ceasbarre but let's see if anyone with access to the code can look up what causes the error msg to be emitted, or maybe someone will post who has had the issue and solved it. Meanwhile, if there is any information you'd like from the system, pls post and I'll provide it.

not a problem, i'll just wait to for someone who can provide solution for this based from previous experience. and, if you figure it out yourself i hope you don't mind coming back to tell us the solution. :)

Hi, You have tried many methods to solve your problem, but it still persists, I would suggest you could take the following steps to check the result: 1. Please check the Windows Backup relevant services and dependencies, ensure they are started: Volume Shadow Copy Windows Backup 2. Run chkdsk /r command to scan the hard disk. 3. Perform a Clean Boot to check the result. 4. Perform an in-place upgrade(don't need reinstall your applications). Hope it helps. Regards, Alex ZhaoPlease remember to click Mark as Answer on the post that helps you, and to click Unmark as Answer if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.

Alex, thanks for posting. VSC and Backup are running; chkdsk finds no problems; clean boot works fine but attempting to create a restore point still generates the same error msg. This system didn't come with media for an in-place upgrade, but I requested it and it should arrive soon.

Well, I gave up trying to find the problem, and I gather it's not frequent enough to warrant more interest from MSFT, so I did a OS re-install, ie., a 'repair install' or 'in-place upgrade', where Win 7 is installed from DVD using the 'upgrade' option. This causes the installer to save applications, user files, and most (but not all) settings, do the install, and then restore apps, users, and settings. It took about 4 hours, including about 15 minutes to touch up a few UI settings. After the repair install, the problem with restore points was gone. Zero space was allocated to restore points after the install, so I bumped it up to 5% and then successfully created a manual restore point. Since then, the restore system has been functioning as expected (eg., prior to installs, etc). Prior to the re-install, I uninstalled three applications that I considered candidates for having caused the problem but all three apps re-installed without re-creating the restore point problem -- so apparently they were not the cause of the original problem. My thanks to those who posted trying to help with this problem. Too bad we never found the problem, but I'm happy that a repair install (instead of a full, from-scratch install) was able to eliminate it, saving me the considerable time of re-installing apps.