Help w.t.f

I am fixing an Alienware notebook running Windows XP Professional and when I turn it on, it goes directly to the Windows Splash Screen,(like usual) then all of a sudden, it goes directly to the checking file system screen on c: Type I'm using NTFS.

Anyways, it says CHKDSK is verifying files (stage 1 of 3) completes it. Then on Stage 2 it freezes. It will stay at 0% percent. It has been like this for the past hour. It freezes and I cannot do anything. I have to do a *hard* shutdown (hold button in until it shuts down)

So, I try *last known good configuration* setting it will load into the windows desktop. However, the taskbar will not display (no start button, no time clock etc...) and the mouse will not move.

So then I tried Safe Mode the script comes down and again it freezes will not load into any desktop.

I tried safe mode with networking same thing.


I can access the desktop however, the mouse does not move and the taskbar will not load at all causing the software not to respond. If I could access just anything in the system I could fix this issue but it keeps freezing. I checked the BIOS all hardware is being detetected in their. No loud noise at all from the machine. Their is some important information on the system, that I need to get off of the hard drive before any reformatting.

Anyone have any ideas on what it could possibly be? PS; I do not have a hard copy of the windows XP Disk otherwise I could access Recovery console.

Anyone have any ideas on what might be causing this issue? I have no clue what the doctor was doing before this occured? He was busy with a patient and I did not want to disturb him. Any and all help is greatly appreciated. Later, Mike

Could you boot off of a Live linux CD to grab the data at least?

Are there any built in hardware diagnostic utilities?

Thank you for the reply. How can I tell if their are any hardware diagnostic utilities? Press F2 to enter BIOS. Press F8 to access different windows options. PS; I don't have any system disks or anything like that. Unless, they partitioned a drive with that software on it. I will have to check the manual online for it unless you know how/where to find it

Sounds like the hard drive is going to me....I would grab the data before trying anything else either by using a boot disk or slaving the drive in another machine.

MLF

I would tend to agree with MLF on this one. --

The diagnostic utilities might be accessible from the boot menu [usually F12 while booting], or through BIOS. I would stop trying to boot into Windows. As noted in a couple of previous threads, chkdsk can do more harm to a drive than good. It concerns me that it is coming up every time you boot, and then locking up.

I would make it your first priority to back the data up. [Before you even run diags]

Thank you for the replies. I am on the phone with them right now with phone support, let you know how it goes, Thanks for the replies.

okay, the system was bought back in 2005 the warranty expired in 2008 It's either hard drive or memory

I would put $$ on the hdd. Though, I have been wrong about failing hdds recently, as other threads will show. Still better safe than sorry. Usually the data stored on a system is the most valuable part. back it up! :D :drink:Edit: eh... I am not sure why this is double spacing... any ideas Joe?

Grab Hiren's Boot CD, burn that to a blank CDR, change BIOS to allow you to boot from CDR.

it has a range of tools let it run a chkdsk with the /f /r flags enabled. (It will scan for bad sectors and attempt to repair.

It will also contain mem testing hard drive testing tools etc there isn't any harm running them also.

westin what browser you using? it could be a .js issue on your end. grab Ccleaner if you already don't and give that arun. :)

HYBR|D - I was using FF under Ubuntu when I posted that. I will take another look tonight if I remember.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by westin

HYBR|D - I was using FF under Ubuntu when I posted that. I will take another look tonight if I remember.

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Late to reply, sorry bud. :( Anyhoooo'w, i grabbed the latest FF 3.6.8 and slapped a fresh install on my Suse11.3 install and i noticed that i got the double spaced lines also???

i noticed that if i clicked the preview message it would show the double lines, i would then remove the extra line break and mash post and it seemed to appear normal..

It has happened on a few other places i frequent, from the info iv'e dugged up from googling it seems to be confined to this version of FF and the way it's handling .js under *nix :confused:

anyhow we can atleast sleep easy n not be paranoid. :D

Heh. Many thanks.

I would run Spinrite on the disk. Chkdsk is probably hanging on a damaged sector. Spinrite will at least show the damaged sector and do a partial recovery of the sector to a new re-mapped sector. You'll still have to replace the drive but you should be able to get the data back. It's expensive and probably not worth doing if you can get the data off with the drive in the state that it's in. But it's good software to have in general for emergencies. I once had a client with a laptop that was writing to the disk when it was dropped from a table. It would not boot at all. After ~46 bad sectors were relocated and partially recovered, the drive booted up normally and all the data was able to be backed up.

The tool I would use is roadkil's "unstoppable copier". It works at a very low level, irrespective of drive format, and tries to rebuild the files at the byte level.

You need a spare drive or partition of the same size as the one you are trying to recover.

You might consider investing in SATA/PATA 2.5"/3.5" USB drive docking stations as well? If you do then be sure to get them with their own power supply, as the little caddies might have problems with big drives. They are pretty cheap these days, I just got 2 and I guess I paid around 20 bucks for the pair.

http://www.roadkil.net/

It has saved my (customer's :lildevil:) butt more than once.

So long as the drive will spin up, it will have a go, so it doesn't matter if the drive has physical or electronic damage.

It is also FREE :D