Super-techs - To My Rescue!

[Fierce Critter]

The machine: Sony Vaio PCG-993L

Hardware of import: 2 harddrives, a 6GB C and a 2nd which is 8GB, but I don't recall the identifier, D maybe.

Operating system: Windows XP Pro

The before: Got this laptop from a co-worker of Jon's. Had an error message at start-up (I don't recall what the error message was, or if it's the same one I'll be referring to later) that you could just click out of and Windows would work fine, if slowly (I forget the size of the processor, but Jon says it's damned good, at least a P3). But it had a problem in that the AC connection was obviously loose from it's motherboard moorings (This is the 2nd laptop we've had with this problem).

The intention: reinstall Windows to eliminate error message, but first crack that bitch open and fix the AC connection on the motherboard

The result: AC reconnection went fine. Upon restarting the laptop, it would do the same thing as before - give you an error message, you could click out of it, then Windows would start normally, if slow. Time to reinstall Windows for a clean slate.

The problem: Doing the reinstall the "easy way" wasn't working, so I was going to have to do it the "hard" way. But before doing so, I wanted to run chkdsk to allow the computer to find and fix the disk errors it said needed to be addressed. So I did.

And it ran ALL DAY. I checked it once in a while to be sure it was actually DOING something. It was. It took hours.

I wasn't in front of the laptop when it finished chkdsk. But what I did see was that the computer had re-booted itself, and was, again, asking to run chkdsk, as the disk "needs to be checked for consistency". So I let it. And it ran through the process rather quickly. It says "verifying files and folders", then when finished, says it found "no problems". But then as soon as that screen is finished, VERY quickly, so fast I had to watch it do this about a half dozen times to read anything, a dark blue screen comes up and what I can make of it says CONFIG_LIST_FAILED, and a bunch of other stuff that goes by too fast to read, including "check to be sure any new hardware or software... etc.". Then, it goes to the windows black start-up screen again, and once again, the "run chkdsk" request comes up. If I click out of the chkdsk, it immediately asks to run it again (both times on the C drive), so I'll click out of that. The blue screen flashes, the black Windows startup screen comes on, then chckdsk requests come again. This will happen over and over and over.

Jon claims that when chkdsk finished, he was there and he saw the screen and that there were messages coming up saying that there wasn't enough memory for something, I don't know what.

And when the chkdsk it goes through now finishes and the "no problems" message comes up, it lists the number of files, disk space used, etc. The most interesting thing I can find about that is it looks like there is only 8kb space left on the drive. The C drive is 6GB. The 2nd hard drive is 8.

What in the world is going on here, gang? And how in hell do I fix this? I'd love it if I could somehow bypass the C drive and go to the 2nd hard drive, install Windows on that, and then either fix the C drive or just eliminate it altogether (it would be grand to have that 6GB of space, but we could get by without it).

I have tried going into the Bios, and to be honest, I don't see anywhere on there that there is a 2nd hard drive, but unless I'm using a step-by-step how-to, I am incredibly unfamiliar with things Bios, and I may be missing something.

Again, the computer would bring up Windows fine until I allowed it to go through chkdsk. So this should have nothing to do with anything that happened when the computer was open (read: I didn't slip with a screwdriver and lop anything off).

The only other thing I can offer is in the BIOS, I did disable the hard disk. What came up upon reboot was a message over and over saying "no operating system found" or something like that. I went back into the BIOS and re-enabled the hard drive, and returned to this problem.

I have a couple things to do right now. But if anyone wants to walk me through anything today, lemme know and I'll bring up YIM.

[HipsterDufus]

chkdsk has f#cked up a couple of installations that I've played with. I HATE that program. If you're going to run it, you'd better have it prompt you for fixing stuff and you'd better know the purpose of the files it wants to "fix". If it were me, I'd just try doing a fresh install of Win XP and see what happens. The current installation is not worth saving, IMHO, especially since you were just gonna get rid of it anyway.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

What you have is a bad sector or two (or many) on your hard drive. Most likely, from the description, in some very important places of your drive.

Just do a reinstall of XP but do the long format of the hard drive. A long format will mark the bad sectors as unusable and save the hassle. Also, start looking for a new drive. If your getting bad sectors.. more are goingto happen.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

BTW, chkdsk is the only thing that will diagnose real hardware problems with a drive or real problems in the files system. If chkdsk fucked up some systems for you, it's because you already had file corruption or hardware problems.

Telling someone to not use chkdsk cause it might do something bad is like telling somone to never check thier oil because it might be low.

[Fierce Critter]

What is the 0x000000?? message that is comming up?

Where in the world would I see that??? That quickly flashing blue screen?

As for the rest, if someone would tell me what route to take to a fresh install of Windows, I'll do that. But the problem I'm having is I can't bring up safe mode (it freezes in a list with a driver called Mup.sys as the last thing on the screen), and I have no clue how to bring up a command prompt without going through Windows.

I put a fresh copy of Windows XP on another laptop on which I'd wiped the drive clean of everything INCLUDING the OS. On that one, I booted with a set of floppies on which the drivers for the CD Rom were installed. Can I do the same in this case? (I have the CD Rom drive as the first thing to boot from now, but it reads it and goes straight to the hard drive instead of acting on the Windows setup on the CD).

Also, like I said, there are 2 hard drives. Just 'cause C is fooked, doesn't necessarily mean the other one is, too, right? Is there a way to bypass C when I install and install on D instead?

Thanks, everyone. You're all great.

[HipsterDufus]

BTW, chkdsk is the only thing that will diagnose real hardware problems with a drive or real problems in the files system. If chkdsk fucked up some systems for you, it's because you already had file corruption or hardware problems.

Telling someone to not use chkdsk cause it might do something bad is like telling somone to never check thier oil because it might be low.

Yes, you're right. I guess I should have clarified. I've had installations that I knew had problems, but at least I could get in there to back the data up. However, chkdsk would then run on a reboot (usually while I'm going to get a tasty beverage and can't cancel it) and then it would make the entire system completely unbootable. Like I said, this has happened a couple of times. Then I have to pull the hard drive to get the data I want and it's just a big old freaking hassle. That is what I don't like about it.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

and you suggest end users should use that? If it's just a file corruption problem and not a hardware error (which you know as well as I do that it's ususally a software level problem) thats a pretty high learning curve.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

FC.. IM me.

[Fierce Critter]

While booting press F8 on the keyboard, then select "Disable automatic Restart" that will cause it to stick when it hits the blue screen. At the bottom you'll see the "Stop codes".

That is not an option available under F8.

I can bring up the BIOS, but I don't see that as an option there, either.