You might think this sounds like an easy problem to fix, but think again. Here's the deal:

My HDD is corrupted. I generally use Vista, although the only thing I can boot into now is Ubuntu LiveCD, and even that takes a long time because it spends a while spewing errors about the HDD before it finishes booting.

In Linux, gparted can see the partitions on the drive, but says there are errors with the partitions and that I should run chkdsk. Specifically there are "cluster accounting" problems. If I try to mount the drive it fails too, telling me Windows has the NTFS partition marked as in-use. I'm reluctant to force a mount, because if it doesn't work it could further damage the drive. I tried running ntfsfix too. It claims to have run successfully, but it doesn't actually help.

Beyond Linux I got my hands on an XP install disk (SP3), and tried to boot that and run chkdsk, but it doesn't recognize my HDD. That may be because the drive is too large (250GB), but the tutorials for how to work around that are way too confusing and require a working Windows machine. I have my Vista boot disks, but they only boot to a black screen.

So far my only idea is to use an external HDD enclosure to turn my HDD into a USB drive on which I can run chkdsk from another computer, but I don't want to buy an enclosure and take my computer apart if I don't have to. Is there any other way to run chkdsk? I really want to recover the data on this drive. Thanks!

If you have your Windows XP disk

• Insert your Windows XP disk into your computer and reboot
• Make sure the PC is set to run from the CD as the primary boot device.
  NOTE: You do this by setting your PC to boot to the CD-ROM in BIOS (enter bios by pressing f1, f2 or del key during memory count up, then search for boot order, and set the CD as the first boot device)
• When the PC boots, it will boot from the CD...after the first several screens load, you will be given a choice to choose R for Recovery Console. You will be asked to log in.
  NOTE: For Windows XP Home, there is not password, just hit ENTER. For Windows XP pro, ask whomever set up the machine what password they used.

When you see the Recovery console C:\WINDOWS prompt continue to section 3 (Running "ChkDsk")

If you DO NOT have your Windows XP disk

• Download RC.ISO from Here.
• Now burn this ISO image to a CD and boot your computer with it.
  NOTE: Keep in mind that this is different than burning a file to a CD-ROM. If you do not know how to burn an ISO image, then download CDBurnerXP Pro to another Windows machine and install it. Then go Here for instructions for burning the ISO image
• Once the CD is created, place it in the defunct computer
• Then reboot your broken PC with that CD in the CD-ROM drive.
• Make sure the PC is set to run from the CD as the primary boot device.
  NOTE: You do this by setting your PC to boot to the CD-ROM in BIOS (enter bios by pressing f1, f2 or del key during memory count up, then search for boot order, and set the CD as the first boot device)
• When the PC boots, it will boot from the CD...after the first several screens load, you will be given a choice to choose R for Recovery Console. You will be asked to log in.
  NOTE: For Windows XP Home, there is not password, just hit ENTER. For Windows XP pro, ask whomever set up the machine what password they used.

Running "ChkDsk"

• At the Recovery console C:\WINDOWS prompt, type
  

  chkdsk /r

• Press ENTER
• Let this scan run UNINTERUPTED untill completed (30 min or so depending on the drive)
• Report any errors in your next reply
• Once the scan is complete, Type exit, and then press ENTER to quit Recovery Console.
• Your computer will now restart

dsenette:

Thanks for your response, but as I noted in my original post the XP disk will not recognize my hard drive, possibly because the drive is too big. It seems that maybe I need to "slipstream" the XP disk so it can recognize larger drives, but that seems complicated. Also, the disk I downloaded claimed to be XP SP3, which should have large drive support.

Please let me know if there is another way. Thanks again!