[GKeeper959]

Hey, everyone, I'm back.

I'm working on a friend's computer. It's a Dell Inspiron (I know, I know...) 8200 with Windows XP sp2. On boot up, XP tries to load, then gives the blue screen of death reading: "UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME". It does this when trying to boot in normal mode, safe mode, and last known good configuration.

What I've seen out there is that I should make a boot disk and run chkdsk. I've made a boot disk and when I insert it and boot up, it just gives me a command prompt >A:\. That doesn't so much help me because I don't know what to do from there. I made another disk from ntfs.com because I'm pretty certain it's an NTFS computer and I've heard that FAT32 boot disks can't read NTFS partitions. Using that disks opens a program called Active NTFS Reader which is designed to "read and copy files from safe NTFS volumes" and "recover damaged/deleted partitions" among other things, but I have no idea how to work this program, nor if it's even what I want.

I'd like to run chkdsk and see what happens, but I can't quite figure out what I need to do to be able to get to that point. Will chkdsk fix problems or just find them and tell me about them? I can troubleshoot Windows ok, but when it comes to DOS, I'm pretty illiterate. Anyone out there who can help me decipher this stuff, maybe give me a crash course in navigating DOS?

Thanks so much, everyone

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First, your instincts are correct--a win98 boot disk won't help if you had a ntfs formatted system.

Easy way to tell is at a:\> type C: and hit enter

If you get an error, you've probably got NTFS

THE NTFS reader lacks the tools you need.

If you've got the Windows XP disk, you can use the REPAIR USING THE RECOVERY CONSOLE to run chkdsk.

at the prompt, type

chkdsk /f /r

Prepare to wait for a while. It will take a long time

[gerryf]

First, your instincts are correct--a win98 boot disk won't help if you had a ntfs formatted system.

Easy way to tell is at a:\> type C: and hit enter

If you get an error, you've probably got NTFS

THE NTFS reader lacks the tools you need.

If you've got the Windows XP disk, you can use the REPAIR USING THE RECOVERY CONSOLE to run chkdsk.

at the prompt, type

chkdsk /f /r

Prepare to wait for a while. It will take a long time

[GKeeper959]

Ahh, I should have mentioned... my friend has lost his recovery disk That's why I'm trying the boot-up disk method. And yes, if I try to access the C drive in the command prompt, I get an error. But I really want to try this recovery method, I just need a disk. Do you have any idea if a recovery disk from a Dell Latitude will work for an Inspiron?

Thanks.

[gerryf]

only way to know is to try.

Dell changes their recovery disks from time to time....at one time, they were a full windows xp disk with some minor modifications...others are disk images..

Here is another method...

Since you obviously have a second pc. you may be able to build a Barts PE disk, which will allow you to boot windows XP from a CD. It will be a limited version of XP, but it will be more comfortable than farting in DOS

http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/

[GKeeper959]

Gerry, thank you so much for the advice of building a Bart's PE! It did the trick! I was able to get the notebook booted up and run chkdsk, which fixed the problem! My small troubleshooting arsenal is expanding all the time!

Thanks again!

[gerryf]

Barts PE disk rules

[GKeeper959]

you bet!