Complex registry problem

Okay. A coworker of mine just started having this problem and needs this laptop up ASAP and would rather not send it to tech, cause it would take like, a week to get it back.
On Window 2000 pro, by the way.
Started getting the error:
"
Stop c0000218 {Registry File Failure}
The registry cannot load the hive (file):
SystemRoot\System32\Config\Software
or its log or alternate.
It is corrupt, absent, or not writeable.

Beginning dump of physical memory.
Physical memory dump complete. Contact your system administrator or technical support group.
"

Now, my first thought was to use the cd to repair the installation, but that doesn't work.  I'm never given the option to repair. All I can do is fresh istall. No option for recovery console either.  Then I thought to create a boot disk, but no dice.  This laptop has no floppy drive.

Any thoughts?

Use Knoppix to recover the data, then install Lunix to ensure this never happens again.

A Stop 0xc0000218 error message means that a necessary registry hive file could not be loaded. This error message can occur if the file is corrupt or missing. To resolve this issue, you can reinstall the operating system and restore the registry files from a backup. The registry files may have been corrupted because of hard disk corruption or some other hardware problem.

This error message can also occur if the driver has corrupted the registry data while loading into memory, or the memory where the registry is loading has a parity error. In the latter case, turn off the external cache and check the memory chips.

Start your computer by running the Recovery Console, run the chkdsk /p command on the drive, and then restart your computer. Test to determine whether the issue is resolved. If the issue is resolved, do not complete the remaining steps. If the issue is not resolved, go to step 2.

Windows 2000 doesn't have a repair install option. It's a fresh install or nothing.

>>5
What? It does have a repair install. Run the installer. Near where you go to the recovery console, you choose between that or repair an existing installation.

>>1
THE HIVE CLUSTER IS UNDER ATTACK!!!