title: mysqld.exe: Table '.\mysql\db' is marked as crashed and should be repaired
body: <p>The MySQL service will no longer start on my XAMPP installation on a Windows 10 machine.  The error message in the XAMPP console says:</p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>Error: MySQL shutdown unexpectedly.
    This may be due to a blocked port, missing dependencies, improper privileges, a crash, or a shutdown by another method.</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>The error log shows this:</p>
  
  <pre><code>InnoDB: using atomic writes.
  2019-10-14 20:43:47 0 [Note] InnoDB: Mutexes and rw_locks use Windows interlocked functions
  2019-10-14 20:43:47 0 [Note] InnoDB: Uses event mutexes
  2019-10-14 20:43:47 0 [Note] InnoDB: Compressed tables use zlib 1.2.11
  2019-10-14 20:43:47 0 [Note] InnoDB: Number of pools: 1
  2019-10-14 20:43:47 0 [Note] InnoDB: Using SSE2 crc32 instructions
  2019-10-14 20:43:47 0 [Note] InnoDB: Initializing buffer pool, total size = 16M, instances = 1, chunk size = 16M
  2019-10-14 20:43:47 0 [Note] InnoDB: Completed initialization of buffer pool
  2019-10-14 20:43:48 0 [Note] InnoDB: 128 out of 128 rollback segments are active.
  2019-10-14 20:43:48 0 [Note] InnoDB: Creating shared tablespace for temporary tables
  2019-10-14 20:43:48 0 [Note] InnoDB: Setting file 'C:\xampp\mysql\data\ibtmp1' size to 12 MB. Physically writing the file full; Please wait ...
  2019-10-14 20:43:48 0 [Note] InnoDB: File 'C:\xampp\mysql\data\ibtmp1' size is now 12 MB.
  2019-10-14 20:43:48 0 [Note] InnoDB: 10.4.6 started; log sequence number 6899920; transaction id 13408
  2019-10-14 20:43:48 0 [Note] InnoDB: Loading buffer pool(s) from C:\xampp\mysql\data\ib_buffer_pool
  2019-10-14 20:43:48 0 [Note] Plugin 'FEEDBACK' is disabled.
  2019-10-14 20:43:48 0 [Note] Server socket created on IP: '::'.
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>And the Windows Event Viewer contains 5 separate error messages:</p>
  
  <pre><code>mysqld.exe: Table '.\mysql\db' is marked as crashed and should be repaired
  mysqld.exe: Index for table '.\mysql\db' is corrupt; try to repair it
  Couldn't repair table: mysql.db
  Fatal error: Can't open and lock privilege tables: Index for table 'db' is corrupt; try to repair it
  Aborting
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>When an attempt is made to connect to MySQL, it doesn't work (which makes sense because the MySQL service will not run).  This is the error message given in CMD after an attempt is made to connect: <code>ERROR 2002 (HY000): Can't connect to MySQL server on 'localhost' (10061)</code>.</p>
  
  <p>Posts related to MySQL tables that need to be repaired require connecting to MySQL so they do not help in this situation.  If it's possible to repair <code>mysql.db</code> on a Windows 10 machine without connecting to MySQL, what are the steps to do so?</p>