On Sat, 10 May 2008 07:19:54 -0700, Malke <malke@invalid.invalid>
wrote:
>Big Bill wrote:
>
>> Can't boot into XP Pro SP2 past the logon screen, it goes dark. This
>> isn't the graphics issue that can do that, I already had that and this
>> isn't it.
>> Some history - I tried booting into safe, safe was fine. I ran chkdsk
>> in safe, or asked it to run on next boot rather, now I can't get into
>> safe either.
>>
>> If I boot into normal etc. I get chkdsk running all the way through.
>> It finishes, reboots, says the disk's fine (phew!) and hangs.
>>
>> If I try to boot into safe then it hangs after press "esc to not load
>> SPTD.EXE"
>>
>> I have a boot thingy with FreeDOS on it, that won't run either so I
>> can't get to my files (sob!). I get error message PANIC mcb chain
>> corrupted.
>>
>> Not too healthy, I'm thinking.
>>
>> What do we think then, team, do I have to go for some kind of Windows
>> repair, get the XP CD out and hit repair, or maybe download that
>> recovery console microsoft have got, burn that onto something and try
>> it?
>>
>> I'd welcome any advice. It might be of note that some weeks back I
>> installed a new graphics NVIDIA card and that the day the machine went
>> wrong was the hottest day of the year, humid etc. Um. I'm wondering if
>> some goodies aren't damaged in there. Mind, chkdsk does say
>> encouraging things about the disk so maybe not...
>
>The SPTD.EXE is from Daemon Tools or some other drive virtualization
>program. It is well known that programs like this can cause major issues
>because of their low-level drivers. And/or your hard drive may be damaged.
Aha. That does ring a bell.
>1. Test the hard drive with a diagnostic utility downloaded from the drive
>mftr. Obviously you'll need to download and create a bootable CD (with
>third-party burning software since XP's built-in burner doesn't do this)
>from a working computer.
Well I have a CD that boots into FreeDOS which won't work because of
the memory thing - ah, you'd be talking about a boot CD for windows,
yes - would that work? I have another plain vanilla XP machine, can I
make one from that? Or boot from the original XP disk if it surfaces?
I assumed that I probably couldn't because of the memory corruption.
>If the hard drive fails any physical tests, it's dead.
You aren't impressed by the way it passes chkdsk with no problems? I
assumed that means it's ok.
> The only way to get
>data off it will be to send it o a professional data recovery company like
>Drive Savers (my preference) or Seagate Data Recovery. General prices run
>from $500USD on up. Drive Savers recovered all the data on a failed laptop
>drive for one of my clients and it cost $2,700. He thought it was worth the
>money; only you know what your data is worth. I understand that some
>insurance companies are now covering data recovery charges so check with
>yours.
>
>Drive Savers - http://www.drivesavers.com
>Seagate Data Recovery Services - https://www.seagatedatarecovery.com/
Thanks for the link. It's a sata and I back up onto a transportable
hard drive, the type in a caddy you can pull the whole caddy with the
drive from the machine and put it into another machine. So I've only
lost a few files if that's the case.
>2. If the hard drive tests OK, then I'd pull it and slave it in another
>working machine to pull the data off.
I hear what you're saying but that won't be necessary I imagine.
Thanks for helping, any further comments?
BB
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