Hi, this is what happens: I turn on the computer, it starts loading win95 but it stops and shows me the following message: "You may have bad sectors in one of your drives." Scandisk begins, and when it is checking the FAT it suddenly stops and gives me the following message: "Error: Scandisk encountered a data error while reading the FAT on drive C. This error prevents ScanDisk from fixing this device." What is happening? What does this mean? What should I do? Format C? Is there any way I may restore the system without formatting, at least one more time? I would like to copy a couple of documents for which I still don't have a backup... Thanks for your help, Gabriela.

Can you get the system to actually boot into Windows? Can you run scandisk from inside windows? If the FAT table is corrupted you could be in trouble even though there is a second copy of it the disc. Do you know someone with an up-to-date copy of Norton Utilties? If so you want to get a copy of NDD.exe (the DOS version)on to a floppy and run that, it's better than scandisk.

Can you try to exit ScanDisk right after it starts (hit X)? Then Windows *might* load. Quickly backup your files and get out of there. Or, if you could use an emergency boot disk to get yourself to the C: prompt, you can get your data using DOS. But you probably are going to have to format /s. Try this command from the C: prompt after booting from the disk: Scandisk /All/Autofix/nosave/nosummary There are some articles covering this: http://www.s-t.com/daily/04-99/04-09-99/b03ad048.htm http://www.computing.net/windows95/wwwboard/forum/120553.html (they both ended up reformatting) Aside from losing your data, it looks like your drive is bad and you will probably be wasting your time reformatting, since it might go bad again. If what you store on it is important, I'd get a new drive ASAP.

Hello I suggest you to try first this: -turn your PC on and keep pressing F8 untill you reach the Startup Menu (Boot Menu) -select "Command Prompt Only" and type: C:\>scandisk c:/surface/autofix (hit Enter) If the surface scan will be allowed, you'll see if there are bad sectors. You also can try then : -restart using Ctrl+Alt+Del -select from Startup Menu "Safe Mode" -if you can boot in Safe Mode, while you're in Windows, press Start>Run, type this: c:\windows\SCANDSKW and hit OK -select "Thorough" and check "Automatically fix errors" Please post back the results good luck Stefan

Hi all of you, I tried your suggestions and I will post the results of the attempts here, as Stefan requested. 1. I tried to exit ScanDisk right after it started, Windows tried to load, but it stopped and gave me the following error message: "Data Error reading drive C. Abort, Retry, Ignore, Fail?" I made two attempts for this: to retry and to ignore, but the pc did nothing. Thank you anyway Shmanda, for your advice, I read the two articles you mentioned. 2. I turned on my pc, pressed F8 to enter the Startup Menu, chose Command Prompt Only and asked for the scandisk, c:/surface/autofix. The scandisk began, but when it reached the FAT search it stopped at 28% and showed me the dreaded message: "Error: Scandisk encountered a data error while reading the FAT on drive C. This error prevents ScanDisk from fixing this device". Thank you very much Stefan for your advice, do you have any other ideas? 3. Maurice, I can't get into Windows, it begins to load, but it fails and enters into the scandisk which fails too... I will try to find someone with a copy of Norton Utilties as you told me. In the meantime, if any of you guys have any other suggestions I may try, please post them. Thank you! Gabriela.