Chkdsk Errors Out - Urgent Help Needed

[unevendozen]

Hey all,

I am in need of some seriously urgent advice.

Suddenly today I my PC is going in to CHKDSK everytime it boots, saying one of my drives needs to be checked for consistency. Well it gets to stage 2 of three, about 60-75% of the way through and then errors out saying "an unspecified error" occurred. This is the first sign of any hardware issues associated with my drive that I am aware of, other than not being able to install a few games. I figured it was a bad memory problem and was going to get some new RAM this weekend.

Question is, should I even try to save this drive? I mean, it is a work computer for me with priceless (to my clients anyway) data on it that I cant lose. Is this truly a sign of a dying harddrive? Would a reinstallation of windows, if successful, simply be false hope? I would rather buy a new HDD then chance it. On the other hand, if this truly something that reformat would solve I would much rather do that.

Oh hey... one more thing. About a month ago I had to reinstall windows because the system would NOT boot. It would get to the desktop and freeze. Safemode worked fine tho. I figured it wasa corrupted file or a virus at the time....

Thanks,

Eric

 

[Severian]

Is the drive passing SMART testing in the BIOS? Any reason to think the drive itself is failing, i.e., advanced age or clicking sounds, etc? Is it the only drive in the machine?

 

[unevendozen]

SMART testing? If you mean, is it getting past the BIOS portion of the boot, then yes. It only enters CHKDSK after I see the Windows XP loading screen.

The only reasons to think the drive might be failing are the ones I mentioned. Consisitent freeze at desktop when booting which led to a reformat. Unable to install World of Warcraft and Company of Heros. And now this. I will say since I posted this it seems to be WORSE. Now after CHKDSK errors out, the system reboots. The only way I can get to the desktop is by aborting chkdsk. An hour ago it would error out but then continue to load Windows.

The drive isnt old, as far as I know. It was bought OEM from NewEgg less than four months ago. No clicking sounds, though when I do start up it seems like the humm of the drive or fan spinning up has changed. It seems to sound like "mmmmmmmmmmmmmm uh-ummmmmmmm uh-mmmmmmm". I know that looks crazy but if you sound it out thats truly what I hear. I dont recall hearing that before.

 

[Severian]

here's what I would try:

boot off your WinXP CD, then go to the recovery console. At the prompt, type "CHKDSK /f" without the quotes. Then go get a cup of coffee, it'll take a while. If you're lucky, the corruption can be repaired so you can get to your desktop. At that point I would back up all important information immediately. Then I would download the drive manufacturer's diagnostic utility from their website and have it test the drive for problems.

what was the error message you were getting when game installation failed?

 

[unevendozen]

I've run three different diagnostic tools from Seagate. S.M.A.R.T, quick test, and an extensive test. No errors found. I will try to boot from the winXP disc and run chkdsk.

With WoW I was getting various errors. Mostly they said there was corrupt data or disk failure. The thing about that is I got the same errors whether I used my primary OR secondary HDDs.

With Company of Heros I cant install and update patch. It keeps saying that necessary files have been moved or altered. I've been working with Relic (the maker) for a week now. Its been uninstalled and reinstalled at least two dozen times.

 

[cubby1223]

first, get the hard drive out of that computer. Have the computer run memtest for a while. Connect the drive to another computer you know has good hardware, and pull off as many files from the drive as possible, even try cloning the drive to another.

If the drive has physical errors, or if there are other bad hardware in the computer corrupting data, sometimes the worst thing you can do is start by running chkdsk. Basically, you don't want to do anything that writes to the drive.

 

[unevendozen]

Ok, well too late. I already booted from the CD and ran CHKDSK in the recovery console (looked like a DOS prompt).

Whatever it did, I can now boot to Windows without it going in to CHKDSK. I dont know if I should still be worried or not.... Seems fixed, but....?

 

[Severian]

Now I would back up any important data and see how things go. Try re-installing the two games you mentioned. It seems odd that installation would fail on either hard drive. Are they on the same IDE channel, or are they separate? Is your optical drive having any issues besides this?

I do think running Memtest for a while wouldn't hurt either, you obviously have a bad apple in the barrel somewhere that needs finding.

 

[RebateMonger]

Yeah, Chkdsk /f in Recovery Console is a good way to fix logical drive corruption.

Now, take a look at the Windows System Event log and see what kind of errors are being reported. There will also be a recommended "action" shown.

You could have a bad hard drive data cable or a failing motherboard hard drive controller.