ATI 2010 will not uninstall just disables VSS and makes Win XP un bootable

ATI 2010 will not uninstall just disables VSS and makes Win XP un bootable

Long time ago used ATI on laptop and in February 2010 upgrade to 2010 looks like a 6xxx build per a registry entry. Never created secure zone, never used restore, never used non stop back up (NSB) since on main computer no other back ups will work that need VSS (Volume Shadow support) which even when not running etc ATI seems to block.

But on laptop -
All of a sudden last week laptop would not boot. Just a blank gray screen as soon as tries to start Win XP. Will not boot to safe mode or last good config.

This is the first time in like 30 years back to OS2 days, that I had to call in a recommended very experienced local tech person who was also stumped. We thought bad drive (5 yrs old), virus etc, etc. Replaced drive he could find no clue from his massive testing tools other than slow chkdsk on drive (so replaced). Disabled most everything in start up etc.

Then looked in desperation what programs on machine even if not running and that reminded me of Acronis 2010 many problems reported including BSOD - but mine was Gray blank screen and Acronis wasn't running. We also disabled the services it runs and uninstalled it - so we thought - but won't totally go away which leads to current mess.

Well...low and behold... after a ATI 2010 uninstall...it boots after days of trying every other option wasting so many hours and paying the tech guy who only billed for a fraction of the hours he spent on it.. but there is more bad news.

i wanted to change to Shadowprotect or Macrium Reflect but recall warnings to totally remove ATI more than just the uninstaller.

I did try do make image with Reflect but said could not run vss but switched to its own shadow service (pan??) but then failed saying it could not lock the drive (due to ATI I am quite sure).

So I removed or tried to by many ways:
Still showed in control panel and now when remove says corrupted.
Used the more powerful Microsoft remover and it said removed.
Did a regedit search and found what seemed to be many entries.

At this point didn't remember if had upgraded or not from 2009 to 2010.

Found on Acronis site how have to manually removed 2 device drivers and about 5 reg entries which I did. But may have been for 2009. All my references on uninstallers, folders etc only say True Image Home but not 2009 or 2010.

Rebooted and got back my "gray screen of death".

Was able to restore to a restore point from an XP install disk. This I believe wiped out the just made register changes.

Successful reboot.

I ran Revo Uninstaller which on the Acronis forum some of used successfully.

It found 413 register entries and about 690 values!

Now all the removal programs said "corrupt" and could not uninstall.

Examining some of the registry entries does not say 2009 or 2010 but one had a build version 6??? which I Googled and shows it is a 2010 version.

I found on the Acronis site a program to uninstall 2010 after getting and starting the devon? program to take out of device drivers and the Microsoft uninstaller. Did all that. Ran special ATI 2010 uninstaller which successfully completed each step and ends in asking to reboot which I did.

Now it gets bad again. Reboot now says missing hai.dll file! Will not boot to any safe mode or a restore point.

I did from the recovery disk a rebuild of windows, I also extracted successfully the original hai.dll file overwriting the one it found on my drive... reboot.. still missing hai.dll file. I rebuilt the boot.ini file and same result.

After so many hours of wasted time looks like the next "try" should be redoing the Master Boot record and again rebuilding boot.ini or the boot.ini may have the "secret" thing ATI thing in which boots to the wrong hidden? partition on which works for some reports and not others. I spent hours reading so many reports on this and the prior vss issue.

At this point I am tired of al the trying and wasted time. All I want to do is get rid of ATI completely and never use it again. I just want a backup system that works for making images with out having to learn so much to fix it! I have great continuous file back up (or every 10 minutes) uploading with Idrive. Easy to recovery from and keeps as many versions. But in case of a drive failure on operating drive need frequent image backups. My tech guy is trying to get me to go with at least a RAID 1 system. My desktop is business critical (5 screens etc) and believe it or not it lost a motherboard so I had transferred all my important working files to the laptop and now it crashes after Desktop fixed.

I face the same issues on my main primary desktop which also has ATI 2010. For many years it worked great until 2010 and now as with so many other reports kills vss for any other backup program using local drive. Idrive seems to not need it but also have another service used for more than a decade (connected online now Iron Mountain) here no longer can back up open files ever since ATI corrupted the VSs service. Even when not running, with the ATI services stopped and VSS running somehow ATI prevents it from working or it turns on and off at various times... as reported by large number of ATI users all with the activity.

But before I tackle removal from desktop need to get HAI problem solved on laptop. Fortunately no e-mails or files lost but thanks to IDrive certainly not ATI.

I was able to use the ATI recovery disk to make a current image of the drive (images often have the hai.dll problem but maybe if you don't boot from them?) but nothing else. I thought if I reinstall 2010 it may redo registery entries and maybe can than remove but my upgrade install disk doesn't seem bootable so when I can't boot into windows... probably can not reinstall and than try to uninstall again.