XP boot failure - possible HDD problem?

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.help_and_support (More info?)

In desperate need of help - my manufacturers are uncontactable at the
moment, and I have a real nasty problem..

My PC starts up fine, BIOS all OK. Then I get the message about
Windows failing to load because of possible power surge or hardware
problems or something, and a choice between loading Windows normally,
loading the last known working setup, or the three variations on
loading safe mode.

Choosing Normal or Last Working Settings - it just hangs at the black
loading screen with the Windows logo, and the loading bar cycling
indefinitely. Nothing happens, even after leaving it for hours.

Choosing safe mode - I get the list of files being loaded, but then it
freezes at a .sys file, which I think is the last file that gets
loaded.

Tried booting from the WinXP CD. I have a Serial ATA hard drive, so I
press F6 and insert my drivers disk. Files continue to load as
displayed in the bar at the bottom. Then I can choose reinstalling
WinXP or trying the recovery console thing. Both choices lead to the
same thing - it tries to examine the hard drive, and freezes with the
text at the bottom saying:

"Examining 156328 mb disk 0 at id 0 on bus 0 on viasraid"

I've tried removing all hardware except the keyboard and monitor, all
PCI cards removed too. I've looked at the hard drive cables, and there
is no obvious damage. I've tried resetting the CMOS. No luck anywhere.
I would try creating boot disks on floppies, but I doubt it would make
any difference, and I don't have a floppy drive on this little laptop
anyway.

I've played around with the BIOS settings with no luck. If this is
some kind of hard drive problem, the BIOS hasn't noticed it.

Why did this happen in the first place? Well I went away over the
weekend, allowing a family member to use the computer. I get back, and
it's like this. From what they've told me, I think they may have turned
mains power off without shutting down Windows, but nothing worse than
that. Perhaps a virus, but I was quite well protected.

Well thanks for reading. Any ideas or opinions would be very well
received.

My system:

K8V SE ASUS motherboard
AMD Athlon 3700+
Maxthon 160Gig VIA Serial ATA hard drive

Had it working successfully for about 9 months.

Marc.


--
skinima

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.help_and_support (More info?)

skinima <skinima.1sfgdp@pcbanter.net> wrote:

>
>
>Tried booting from the WinXP CD. I have a Serial ATA hard drive, so I
>press F6 and insert my drivers disk.

Why? Serial ATA drives that are not in a RAID configuration should
work okay without any special drivers being loaded.

<snip>


Does your computer have a 3.5 diskette drive?

If so then download the Windows XP boot diskette images for your
specific Windows XP version from
http://support.microsoft.com?kbid=310994

Boot your computer with these diskettes and when it stops at the
command prompt enter the following command:

CHKDSK C: /R

Another option would be to create a bootable Windows XP CD using
Bart's PE Builder from http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/
Boot the computer with this CD and then run CHKDSK C: /R

If CHKDSK cannot run on the hard drive then download the Maxtor
diagnostic utility from their web site and run it to check out the
hard drive itself.

Good luck


Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca

In memory of a dear friend Alex Nichol MVP
http://aumha.org/alex.htm

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.help_and_support (More info?)

In skinima.1sfgdp@pcbanter.net, skinima wrote:
> In desperate need of help - my manufacturers are uncontactable at the
> moment, and I have a real nasty problem..
>
> My PC starts up fine, BIOS all OK. Then I get the message about
> Windows failing to load because of possible power surge or hardware
> problems or something, and a choice between loading Windows normally,
> loading the last known working setup, or the three variations on
> loading safe mode.
>
> Choosing Normal or Last Working Settings - it just hangs at the black
> loading screen with the Windows logo, and the loading bar cycling
> indefinitely. Nothing happens, even after leaving it for hours.
>
> Choosing safe mode - I get the list of files being loaded, but then it
> freezes at a .sys file, which I think is the last file that gets
> loaded.
>
> Tried booting from the WinXP CD. I have a Serial ATA hard drive, so I
> press F6 and insert my drivers disk. Files continue to load as
> displayed in the bar at the bottom. Then I can choose reinstalling
> WinXP or trying the recovery console thing. Both choices lead to the
> same thing - it tries to examine the hard drive, and freezes with the
> text at the bottom saying:
>
> "Examining 156328 mb disk 0 at id 0 on bus 0 on viasraid"
>
I had exactly the same thing yesterday. The examining drive takes a
long while but it does finish eventually - but even after recovery or
fresh installation the fault persisted.

Took computer to repair shop who have reported that the failure was due
to the D: drive. I had been assuming that it was the C: drive that was
the problem despite running chkdsk on it - never thought to look at the
remaining drive..
--
TE