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Just recently, my Windows ME system stopped starting up properly. Everything goes fine until the Windows ME splash screen, then it stops doing anything at all. It just hangs. So naturally, I tried booting in safe mode. But wait, I can't do that, because safe mode doesn't load until AFTER the splash screen.
Naturally, I used a boot disk to scan my registry.
<C:\>scanreg /restore
<C:\>Bad command or file name
<C:\>scanreg
<C:\>Bad command or file nameSo I attempted scandisk. Now, scandisk kept asking me if I wanted to fix an error, so many times that I ended up weighing down the enter key. By the time it was finished (ETA 45 minutes), it found about 3000 bad files/directories and dealt with them. Reboot. No progress made. I tried scandisking and rebooting several more times, with the same results.
So I thought I'd simply reinstall Windows ME, because it seemed like just about everything in my WINDOWS folder was corrupt. But now setup requires me to run scandisk before it installs, so I let it find it's 3000-ish errors, but it seems to simply forget about the installation I asked it to do!
Now I'm locked out of my system completely, I can't access the OS (including safe mode) by any means that I can think of, and all my tricks and tools seem to fail me! Can my PC be saved? :(
It would appear the hard drive is bad.
Boot from a floppy and run SCANDISK C: then when finished undertake a SURFACE SCAN.
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It's not obvious that the HD is bad, as in broken.
It is obvious that the logical structure is scrambled.
Get the mfg's HD util and check that the disk is usable.
Then:
M2
If at first you don't succeed, you're about average.
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How do I get/use mfg's hard drive util? I tried Google and several download sites, but couldn't find anything.
Also, how do I attempt a fresh start when I can't boot the computer at all? (Even from a CD, with CD-ROM support... Even in safe mode) The problem is that I can't seem to do anything useful with my PC, except scandisk. And we know where that takes me. I haven't yet tried formatting my drive and starting COMPLETELY from scratch, but that's because I would like to keep the data on my hard drive. Is this possible? What can I do?
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To add to my previous post... Is there any way to repair/replace my FAT32 without data loss? From DOS?
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Have a look here
Data recovery may be decidedly "iffy", depending on just what's wrong with the drive
Always worth trying a different cable, or ensuring that the current one is snugly connected (you never know)
Life is hard; it's harder if you're stupid. -John Wayne
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You could boot in DOS and save what you can still access. Problem is, where to put it. If the files are many / large they will take a bunch of floppies.
Can you put this drive in another PC which is working properly?
M2
If at first you don't succeed, you're about average.
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that's a good suggestion Mechanix2Go
i did this once with an older HDD and attached it to another PC's Secondary ribbon cable and configured it as a SLAVE on that Secondary (CDROM was Sec Master). Booted THAT PC up and it showed 2 HDDs in windows.
accessed the files of the attached HDD and transferred them to other good HDD and burnt them on a blank CD. Shut PC down removed IDE Cable and power from attached bad HDD, booted up, back to normal.
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Well, I used the software corrosponding to my hard drive on that site (Western Digital Data Lifeguard) and ran the scan, both the Quick and Thorough. Neither found any errors, and it told me accurate information about my drive (such as disk space, operating system, etc) so I've concluded that the drive is not the problem, but something on it is. Does anyone know what I can use to find out exactly what about the filing system has gone wrong, and (more importantly ;)) how to fix it?
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(I didn't see the last two posts until just now, sorry for double posting again!)
I think I'll try that, using another PC to salvage what I can, then formatting/partitioning. Luckily, I have another hard drive with Windows ME loaded onto it, but it's only a 40 gb and it's almost full. Time for me to suck it up though, I guess :) I'll let you all know how it goes.
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I see you ran "scanreg /restore" from C:>
Try
Boot from a boot disk
c:
cd windows
scanreg /restore(Scanreg.exe is located in the windows directory)
If you did not make and changes to the PC before this problem started you may want to run a memory test just to rule out a RAM problem.
See if you can find and download a copy of memtest86.
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I thought of that, johns, but almost my entire Windows folder was corrupt! Alot of my folders were either scrambled, deleted (from scandisk, I imagine) or otherwise FUBAR. Hence my frustration...
But the problem is solved, and my beloved 160gb is healthy again. What I did was along the lines of what Robmoski and M2 suggested, I put that 40 gb hard drive that I was talking about in as a primary master, and the 160 (corrupted one) as the primary slave. I copied everything that I needed to keep onto the 40 gb one, and formatted the 160.
After that, everything worked out without a hitch, and I'm more or less back to where I was (minus about 10 gb of music and stuff >.<). Thanks for all of your help, guys-- I couldn't have done it without you.
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