Major Computer malfunction - Please Help

[Moonliner]

Originally Posted by Tramspotter

Good god you already have him ready to reformat... there will probably be all kinds of HD file errors from all the thrashing around. Rebooting in safemode and shutting down from it two or three times even is the safest first course then try last known good config... then go out and get or download a HD repair utillity and boot off it from CD and let it do a sector by sector repair checkout your HD's S.M.A.R.T. reporting or just a filesystem rebuild and repair and after all that barring any other hardware failures you should consider going more medeval on it's ass and do a clean install.

Make any sense?

Oh and coaster matt made very good point infact I am going to do a canned air blast on all my machines too I did have the windows open most of this weekend.

disneyfan makes another good point a linux boot CD would be a great way to isolate the problem to hardware or Windoze and get more detailed errors as it loads or fails to load

Another problem that might cause this kind of chaos depending on your motherboard is the 3V BIOS & Clock backup battery crapping out worth checking if you have one and after replacing various componants still have intermitant problems if your machine is over 2 years old you should replace anyhow

Good god, did you even read this thread or just jump in the middle of it?


MBC:

Yes, as several posters have mentioned, there are more advanced, time consuming and costly options you can try prior to a reformat. My read on this was that you did not want to spend extra money, and you are not all that comfortable with Linux boot disks and various low level utilities.

However that can be mitigated by the importance of what's on the disk or I could be making bad assumptions about you.

It's your call.

[BarTopDancer]

Originally Posted by Motorboat Cruiser

Can't check to see if I can see the files just yet. I am running chkdsk /r and seeing if it can repair the problems it found. It is taking quite a while but slowly making progress.

Suppose, for laughs, that I can see the contents of the C drive. I don't suppose it is possible to burn a dvd from the command line prompt, is it? Or, as a last resort*, how would I go about transferring files to the USB port via command line.

* I would hate to have to go this route, as I only have a 512MB USB drive and about 10 gigs of files to backup, but I suppose it isn't insurmountable, if it is possible.

If you need it, I have a 150 gig external drive with about 110 gigs of empty space that you are welcome to use while fixing the drive. Let me know.

[DisneyFan25863]

You could also try partitioning your drive and then installing windows on the open partition, dragging your files off the old partition into the new one, deleting the old partition, then resizing the new one to use the entire drive.

You would need access to a CD burner however (there is a program you can run off a CD to help you partition your drive). If you can boot off of a USB drive then you could use that too (its only 40 MB).

I would only use that as a last resort though, as it can be fairly complex.

[CoasterMatt]

I've got linux boot cds, and a spare graphics card or two if you need them

[Motorboat Cruiser]

It's fixed!!!!!!!

Thanks everyone SO MUCH for all of your help and suggestions. It took chkdsk forever to go through the repair process and mentioned that it had to fix a registry error. I'm not sure what caused this but I'm going to be backing everything up tonight, running all of my spyware programs, etc... and be just a little better prepared next time. Lesson learned.

Again, thanks for ALL of your help. You all rock!

A very happy MBC...

[DisneyFan25863]

Originally Posted by Motorboat Cruiser

It's fixed!!!!!!!

Thanks everyone SO MUCH for all of your help and suggestions. It took chkdsk forever to go through the repair process and mentioned that it had to fix a registry error. I'm not sure what caused this but I'm going to be backing everything up tonight, running all of my spyware programs, etc... and be just a little better prepared next time. Lesson learned.

Again, thanks for ALL of your help. You all rock!

A very happy MBC...

Awesome! Luckilly it was nothing too serious!

[Kevy Baby]

My advise? Get a Mac.

Originally Posted by Motorboat Cruiser

My PC is refusing to boot...

Am I the only one who is wondering how he is posting if his 'puter won't boot?

[scaeagles]

I was wondering hat as well.

My last major computer malfunction was when I spilled an entire Diet Snapple Peach Ice Tea in my wife's laptop while it was on.

Easy fix. My wife got a new laptop.

[Motorboat Cruiser]

Originally Posted by Kevy Baby

My advise? Get a Mac.

I would but I prefer to have more than 5 games to choose from.

Am I the only one who is wondering how he is posting if his 'puter won't boot?

Luckily, we're a multi computer household.

[DisneyFan25863]

Originally Posted by Motorboat Cruiser

I would but I prefer to have more than 5 games to choose from.



Luckily, we're a multi computer household.

You can run Windows on a Mac now

Piece for piece, Macs are actually cheeper than comparable PC systems. I heard somewhere that people are getting 40-60 FPS on BF2 with MacBooks (with have intergrated graphics!)