So I decided to restart my computer and all of a sudden I got that "check disk for errors" messege when you manually turn off the comp, you guys know what I'm talking about.( but the problem here is that, that shouldnt of came up in the first place because I didnt manually turn off the computer or anything like that I just restarted) Well anyways they usually they take between 3-5 mins, but not this one, this one took about half an our or more. Why was this? towards the end, around 97%, it said something that it had fixed a cluster?!? it also did a "check for space" really odd, it never did that before. Does anybody know whats going on? I'm hoping its a one time thing, and if it does happen again, how would I go by escaping from that? I tried everything to try to escape but nothing. Can anybody enlighten me here? thanks.

A cluster on your HDD became corrupted and had to be "repaired". Back up anything on your HDD that is essential. If it continues to happen, get a new HDD.

You should NEVER try to stop Checkdisk; it can fix problems you don't even know you have. You might not know much about computers or WinXP, but Checkdisk is a good basic utility, so don't interfere with it. As Badboy has suggested, backup any critical data, just in case your HDD is beginning to fail, and don't interfere with Checkdisk, unless you don't mind losing data...

Hi, ChkDsk will check the file system very quickly, but it takes much much longer to run in THOROUGH Mode. In Thorough it checks and attempts to repair every part of the drive sector by sector. Auto runing of Thorough mode indicates a more serious problem with the drive. If Through mode now says all is well watch the drive for a while. If it keeps finding errors, start worrying. Luck, Jim

Download a free diagnostic utility from the maker of your hard drive's web site, and run the diagnostic test(s) on your drive. If the drive passes all diagnostics (there is often a shorter and a longer test - run all of them), you're fine. What can cause a problem like you experienced in that case? - a power spike or surge, if your computer is not properly protected from that, for one. If it doesn't pass the diagnostics, your hard drive is beginning to fail.

AH! I guess the problem is bigger than I thought. Well lucky I ordered a new HDD from new egg that should of gotten today but I guess until monday now. Well yeah as soon as I get that Im going to transfer important files to my new hdd. Tubesandwires, thanks I'll try and go to Hitachi's website because IBM HDD's are now Hitachi. Further suggestions still welcomed. Thanks all