Vista - vista 32 cannot/will not repair/boot/solve the world's problems

posting from another computer:
Dell Desktop (6 months old)
running Vista Home 32

No problems whatsoever for 6 months until Monday night black screen with blinking cursor.

Rebooted.
Got the message saying cannot start up normally.. disk may need synchronizing (can't remember the exact wording of any of messages)
1. tried to run chkdsk. hung for HOURS.
2. tried to run repair thingie from vista disk. that says it may take an hour or more but i gave up after 6 hours.
3. tried booting into safe modes. does not boot past crcdisk.sys
4. used vista disc again. said i cannot restore to an earlier point because of disk errors. was able to run cmd prompt. all my files are still on the C:
moved some files to external drives without error using the move command.

5. used linux knoppix or whatever it's called hoping to "fix" what i can or at least find out why it's not booting at all. decided i'm in way over my head.

normally i wouldn't care, just move all my personal stuff to externals and try to reformat, but 1) i've got programs i no longer have working install discs to and 2) don't want to reformat a hard drive that's dead.

so.. what can i do?
i've read things about deleting/renaming files like pcmcia.inf (whatever) or disksub.sys (again.. not positive that's what it's called)

i am a TOTAL newb so please explain how come a hard drive that "failed" "has errors" still allows me to move files from C: to externaldrives without fail?

all hope can't be lost right?

please obi wan...

ps.
i have no idea what my total specs are. i know i've got 2gb ram, 120 gb HD but beyond that i can't tell you.

sounds pretty bad ...the good thing is ..

It's Only 6 ms old...still underwarranty ....

i'd return it to factory for repair .....

Doesn't sound like it is a mechanical dead stop - more like trouble with the sectors/filesystem.

You could use a bootable imaging app to save the contents of the drive to an external hd - or clone it.

Send the machine back. They may fix it - if you end up with a new machine or HD - at least you have the contents saved elsewhere - you may be able to restore from that.

Boot it again and try and post the exact error message - it may throw some light on the issue.

If it's still under warranty, take it to a shop and have them run a hard drive diagnostic on it (under the warranty) - that'll tell you if you've got a dead hard drive.

Yeah good ideas. I'm currenly MANUALLY copying everything I really need to an external HD through cmd prompt (robocopy yadda yadda). Never realized how much "fun" that was.

Once I get done copying my music folder I'll take some screen shots (literally with my iPhone) of boot up error messages and upload them.

What I meant earlier about bot being able to restore was it said there were disk errors that needed to be fixed before it could run sysrestore. Trouble is, as you now know, I cannot get chkdisk to work/it hangs for hours and hours telling me to be patient.

Last resort is take it to a shop/send back because I'd really like to try to fix it on my own. That's the only way I learn.

Can someone help me out since I CAN seem to be able to get into cmd prompt using vista install disc and I can also use linux knoppix?

Can I "resort" the filesystem fro
one of those avenues into the machine?

And cheers for your reponses

MB

Let us know when you finished copying your stuff off I have a couple of ideas.

Ken

SIW2 - I've never known anything about imaging/cloning... but I just went out and bought a 1TB external HD which is obviously more than my internal HD that's giving me issues.

I get the bit about copying files as I'm doing right now, but if I clone/image the internal C: drive, and forgive the newbness of this question, will I later be able to use all my programs as well??? That would ROCK.
Some of them, a small percentage admittedly are non-purchased, but overwhelmingly they are store bought (like all my Rosetta Stones, Sony Video software etc., ).

I just don't want to have to go and do all the updates, my preferences and settings to them all over again.


zigzag - Will do. Cheers.

ok.. here are the screenshots.
but this is basically it:
1. a normal startup gets me to the arrow but nothing else. see pic

2. startup again and it tells me i need to run chkdsk. so i try to boot to cmd prompt to do that but that cmd prompt hangs at crcdisk.sys see pic.

3. use vista disc and to run system restore. that tells me i have errors that need to be fixed. try to fix errors. that hangs for DAYS.

4. use vista disc to run cmd prompt then chkdsk.. that tells me that it is "unable to read security descriptor data stream" see pic

I'm afraid a low level format will be needed, and if you still receive errors to purchase a new drive. The fact that it failed as it did and it hangs with error checking may point to bad sector(s).

Yup. Backed everything up, reformatted and reinstalled vista. HD back to fast and responsive a la pre-problems days.

Not worth the headache once I got that 1tb external and managed to copy/move files through cmd.

Thanks everyone who tried to help though!

Marc