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What Di dI Do Wrong To Make My Computer Not Boot?


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#1
LoveMyWii

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I use my computer to DJ. I've got over 17,000 mp3's, 5,300 karaoke tracks and 3,000 music videos. I've got about 6 drives in my machine totaling over 1TB of storage space. I loved my machine until recently when it wouldn't boot anymore. All of my media files are on different drives with the C drive only used for program files.

I'm running XP with 2GB RAM.

For some reason a few weeks ago my machine was doing a checkdisk upon bootup and someone held the power button down to shut it off. After that my machine wouldn't boot anymore. I just get a blank screen.

Any ideas on what it could be? I was going to take it to Best buy to have them look at it this week.

Thanks!
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#2
wannabe1

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Hi LoveMyWii...

Is this a brand name machine (if so, provide us with the make and model number) or a custom build?

Do you have your XP installations cd?

wannabe1
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#3
LoveMyWii

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Thanks for the reply.

Yes, it's a Gateway 9310.

Here's the specs that came with the computer.

Intel Pentium 4 Processor 630 (3.0GHz, 800MHz, 2MB L2) 1
Intel 915G Motherboard w/Integrated Marvell Gigabit 1
2048MB 533MHz Dual-channel DDR2 SDRAM (4-512MB modules) 1
FPD1760 17" Silver LCD Flat Panel Display (17" Viewable) 1
nVidia GeForce 6800 Ultra w/256MB DDR3 Dual DVI & TV-Out 1
TV Tuner w/ Wireless Remote & Receiver 1
120GB 7200rpm Serial ATA hard drive w/ 8MB cache 1
16x Double-Layer Multi-Format DVD Writer DVD¦/R¦RW/CD-R/RW 1
SoundBlaster Audigy 2 Audio w/IEEE 1394 (Firewire) 1
Premium Wireless Key Keyboard & Mouse
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#4
wannabe1

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What needs to be done is to let that disk check complete. However, it can't do that now that it won't boot so it will have to be run from a cd. Unfortunately, the Gateway cd's do not provide for this option.

Download RC.ISO and burn it to a cd as an ISO image. You may need a burning toy like ISO Recorder to do this...be sure to get the version for the operating system installed on the machine you will be using to burn the cd.

Insert the RC.ISO disk into the CD-ROM drive, and then restart the computer.

Click to select any options that are required to start the computer from the CD-ROM drive if you are prompted to do so. Watch for the prompt to "Press any key to boot from cd"...when you see that prompt, press the spacebar.

When the "Welcome to Setup" screen appears, press R to start the Recovery Console.

If you have a dual-boot or multiple-boot computer, select the installation that you want to access from the Recovery Console by number (usually 1).

When you are prompted to do so, type the Administrator password. If you have not set a password, leave it blank and press "Enter".

At the Recovery Console command prompt, type chkdsk /r and press "Enter". (Note the space before /r)

This will start a very long check of the file system. Be patient...let it finish. It may appear that the check hangs or even back up a few times...this is normal. When the test completes and you are again presented with the command prompt, type exit and press "Enter"...the machine will restart. Let it try to boot normally...do not boot to the cd this time.

Let us know if this gets you back into Windows.
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#5
LoveMyWii

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Thank you so much. I'll try that fix tomorrow!
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#6
LoveMyWii

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OK, here's where I stand now. I tried to install that recorder progrma but it didn't let me. I then just used windows to burn that rc.iso file to a cd.

I powered up my machine and quickly hit the cd drive to open and insert the burnt cd. To my surprise the windows logo appeared and then it started to do a check disk on one of my drives. It's the same drive that has been requiring a check disk upon start for a few weeks now.

The process seemed to finish but it just stayed at that check disk screen even though all the stages were finished and said so. After about an hour I simply held the power down and restart. It again asked for a disk check but i skipped it and it went right to my desktop and everything seems to be working beutifully now.

How long should I wait for the chekc to finish? It finished all 3 stages but didn't do anyhting after that until I reset it.

The good thing is that it's not a drive I really need so I may just take it out and replace it with a bigger one anyway.
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#7
wannabe1

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It needs to run the complete check...which is 5 stages and takes a good long while.

Now that you're in Windows, we can set it to run from there. Click Start, then Run, type cmd and press "Enter". This will open a command session. In the command session window, type chkdsk /r and press "Enter". You will be told the drive is busy and asked if you want to schedule it to run on the next boot...type Y and press "Enter". Type exit and press "Enter" to close the command session. Reboot.

This will start a very long check of the file system. Be patient...let it finish. It may appear that the check hangs or even back up a few times...this is normal. When the test completes and you are again presented with the command prompt, type exit and press "Enter"...the machine will restart.

Let us know if this straightens things out for you.

The Geeks to go site will be offline tonight for a few hours while we move to a new server.
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#8
LoveMyWii

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Sounds good. I am just glad I am back to a usable computer. lol

I'll be sure to let the check disk run before going to bed tonight and see what happens when I get up.
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