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I have a laptop here running Windows Vista, and it's complaining about corrupt files. There are folders which I can't access. When I try and run chkdisk, it tells me I need to do this at the next reboot since the drive is in use. I go ahead and schedule it to run; however, when I reboot chkdisk never runs.

I have used the system file restore tool (sfc I believe), and it did find a lot of files which it replaced; however, the tool complained that not all files could be repaired, when I look at the CBS log file I see nothing but successes so I'm not sure what files wouldn't restore.

I even found a site out there which had a copy of chkdsk on it to download and try incase my chkdsk became corrupt.

Are there any other options out there? Can I boot off a usb or cd and run chkdsk?

Edit

Just out of curiosity but does anyone know what would cause the Checkdisk not to run at startup?

4 Answers 4

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You can take out the drive, attach it to another PC (you'll need an adaptor if its a 2.5" IDE drive), and then boot that PC and run chkdsk on the drive.

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  • hmm and in the process void the warranty on the laptop probally. I'll have them send it back to dell, a 3 month old laptop shouldn't have bad sectors
    – JoshBerke
    May 5, 2009 at 19:10
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    The hard drive is a user servicable part on a dell laptop and removing it will not void the warranty. You don't know that it does have bad sectors, just because a disk is corrupted does not mean it has bad sectors. If you want to check for bad sectors then run the diagnositcs partition (on a dell laptop press the option diaplayed at start up). It may be you reimaged away the diagnositc partition, in which case you the diagnostic disk. If that detects an error you can likely get the disk swapped out, but you still might need to get the data off. May 5, 2009 at 19:17
  • Interesting thanks for taking the time and the advice. I hate when people think I'm a software developer that I can fix all their hardware issues:-) Sofware != Hardware again thanks I will look into the diagnostics tools
    – JoshBerke
    May 5, 2009 at 19:31
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You should have gotten a recovery disk with your laptop. Boot from it, go to command line, and you should be able to run chkdsk manually. I had to do that on my Dell some time ago.

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I would try to use SpinRite, from www.grc.com, to see if it can fix something physically bad or weak on the machine. Sounds like a typical spinrite case to me.

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  • Anyone ever used this software are its claims true?
    – JoshBerke
    Jun 2, 2009 at 13:41
  • I think the claims are true. I have never had it help me with major disasters, but it certainly keeps disks spinning better after you run it (since it helps the disk find errors that it can still correct). I believe in it :) Aug 17, 2009 at 12:35
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You could download, burn, and try to boot from the official Vista Recovery Disc.

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