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#1
destinydawn

destinydawn

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HELP ME!

i shut down my computer one evening when i took a nap and it shut down normally, no errors.
but when i went to turn it back on, there was a black screen with white writing saying "DISK BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER"

the only problem is that i don't have a system disk.

i've tried everything.

what do i do?

or where can i obtain a disk?

(i'm on my laptop now. my router will still work.)
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#2
Ztruker

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Check the floppy drive, make sure there IS NOT a diskette in it.
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#3
destinydawn

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where do i find the floppy drive?

because i checked front and back of my computer and there isn't anything inserted anywhere.
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#4
Ztruker

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That means you do not have a floppy drive. It would be very obvious if you did :)

Boot your XP CD. If you don't have one download either of these and create a bootable CD from the .iso file

XP Recovery Console
Another XP Recovery Console


You don't burn the iso file itself to CD., you create a CD from the iso file using your CD burning software.

Boot the CD and at the first opportunity, enter R to start the Recovery Console. From the command prompt, enter:

chkdsk c: /p(or chkdsk c: /r for a more thorough scan and recovery).

See if that resolves the problem.

If not boot the RC again and enter

fixboot

See if that fixes it.
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#5
destinydawn

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thanks a bunch.

i'm getting ready to burn the cd now.

but just a quick question before i do - will this delete all of my pictures and music form my desktop computer when i put the cd in?
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#6
Ztruker

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I hope it doesn't but you could lose none, some or all if they are corrupted. Do you have a backup?

Most likely you will not lose any but if they are important to you then you need to back them up. One way to do this would be to remove the hard drive from your computer and mount it as a slave drive in another computer, then burn them to CD or DVD.

You could also just buy another hard drive. Remove the current one and install the new one then install XP on it. Once it's fully installed and updated, mount the old drive as a slave and you will have access to all your original data. There are also options of an external enclosure or universal IDE/SATA USB connector.

The state your computer in now doesn't leave any choice though. You need to fix it and this is what needs to be done.
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#7
destinydawn

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well, i really don't know what all of that means.
i wouldn't be sure what to do.
so i'm okay with whatever happens. haha.

i burnt the cd and put it into my computer and the recovery console came up so i pressed r.
but when i went to type in the chkdsk c: /p and chkdsk c: /r it said that "the volume appears to contain one or more unrecoverable problems.
so i entered the second on and it said the same.

then i entered the fixboot and it said Fixboot cannot find the system drive, or the drive specified is not valid.

i'm losing hope here. :[.

but thanks for trying to help.

also, do you know what could have caused my computer to do this?
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#8
Ztruker

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It sounds like the drive has died. You can try downloading the diagnostic utility from the drive manufacturers web site, creating a CD from it and running that, see what it says about the drive.
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#9
destinydawn

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can i buy the disk at a computer hardware store?

and can you tell me what may have caused my drive to die?
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#10
Ztruker

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I don't believe you can buy the diagnostic utility disc for the various hard drive manufactures from a store. The CD normally comes with a new drive or you download it and create the CD on your computer. If th ecomputer you are using doesn't have a CD burner, perhaps a friend could do this for you?
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#11
happyrock

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another thing you can try...without removing the drive to recover your data..
get puppy linux...Get puppy-2.16-seamonkey-fulldrivers.iso download it and burn it to cd ...if you don't have a burning program that will burn .ISO files go here and get burncdcc ..a small FAST no frills iso burning program...make sure in the bios the cd drive is the first boot device....put the cd in the cd drive..boot your computer....puppy will boot and run totally in ram...if your hardware is is good working order you will know...
after you get it running and your at the desktop...you take the puppy linux cd out and then you can use the burner to copy all your data to cd/dvds
you can also use it to backup your data to a external usb harddrive or usb flash drive..just have it hooked to the computer when you boot up with puppy...
==========================
quick guide for saving data...music..files on a system that will not boot using puppy Linux..

after you get to puppy desktop..
click on the drives icon...looks like a flash drive...top row..it will list all the drives connected to
your computer...

click on the red icon for the drive you want to mount...in this case its a flash drive ...puppy will

mount the drive..the drive icon turns green when its mounted...
minimize the drives mounter window..you will need it again in a few minutes..
drag the right edge of it sideways to shrink it to its narrowest size...then drag the window to the
right edge of the screen...

now click on the icon that looks like a filing cabinet (kind of yellow) on the main drive...it should
already be green..if its not green ...click on mount
you will see a list of all the folders on the main drive Usually your C: drive..shrink that window to

the narrowest you can..drag that window to the left side of the screen...
at this point you should have 2 windows open on your desktop..the flash drive on the right side..
go back to the folders on the C: drive...click on the documents and settings folder...then your user
name or all users..find the folders that has your data..
drag and drop the folder with the data you want to make copies of to the flash drive window...

your options are to move ..copy ect...JUST COPY..if its to big you will have to open the folder and
drag and drop individual files until the flash drive is full...(I have a 120 GB external USB drive for
big data recovery jobs and a 4 GB flash drive for the smaller jobs)..after you get the files copied to
the flash drive...
Click on the drives mounter you minimized earlier
UNMOUNT THE FLASH DRIVE by clicking on the green icon..you will once in awhile get error messages when
unmouting the drive..ignore them..when the flash drive icon turns red again its safe to remove the
flash drive..trot on over (stroll if you want to look cool) to another computer and plug in the flash
drive and copy all the data files ( I drag and drop) to the other computer..
make sure the other computer can read them...

now delete the data on the flash drive...take it back to the misbehaving computer and plug it in

again..click on the drives icon again and repeat until you have all your data transferred to the working
system..
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