[rshaffer61]

you can run the chkdsk command but you would have to put it in as chkdsk ?: /r
where ? is the letter of the drive you want to scanW

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Just a followup, I slaved the HD to another PC yesterday and ran BitDefender on it - no adware/spyware or virus were found.
I am assuming the only thing to do is to try a XP repair. My question here is do I need the actual disk for the the copying installed on the laptop or can I use any XP disk as long as I have the key?
Thanks....

[Gene R]

Just a followup, I slaved the HD to another PC yesterday and ran BitDefender on it - no adware/spyware or virus were found.
I am assuming the only thing to do is to try a XP repair. My question here is do I need the actual disk for the the copying installed on the laptop or can I use any XP disk as long as I have the key?
Thanks....

[rshaffer61]

Being a laptop it probably has a recovery partition on the hd already. Depending on the model of laptop it will use a key combination to access that partition.

[Gene R]

I'll slave it back into another PC and check on the recovery partion... in the mean time here is what I have done.

While slaved I ran chkdsk (from windows) and it didn't report any problems. It is a 40gb drive and only had ~1.5gb free on it. I ran cleanup and got it to ~3.5gb free.

I will try chkdsk x /r from command prompt and see what it finds...

Thanks ever so much for your assistance.... I'll keep you posted....

[rshaffer61]

It is a 40gb drive and only had ~1.5gb free on it. I ran cleanup and got it to ~3.5gb free.

OK this means there is less then 10% of the drive free. This will mess up the MFT and cause the system to not boot .
What is the make of the laptop and then I can find the key combination to get to the recovery partition.

[Gene R]

I'm sorry for the long pause, I wasn't able to work on this over the weekend - the other half had me working on the 'honey-do' list!!! We are doing several remodeling jobs on the house....

It is a Dell Inspiron 2200

Thank you for your assistance....

[rshaffer61]

The key combination is CRTL + F11 pushing the keys at the same time at the the dell screen during post. Once you push them then you want to release them.
It should go into the recovery partition so you can do a system restore.

[Gene R]

Thanks, I do that here shortly. First I am going to slave the drive into another machine and back it up so if he needs any data off of it after the restore.

I'll keep you posted and greatly appreicate your assistance....

[rshaffer61]

[Gene R]

Hot [bleep]!!! Backed up the drive, did the CTRL F11, when straight to the Restore app and took about ~10 minutes and the laptop is booting up to an 'as out of the box' configuration!!
I'm going to give the back up to the owner and let him decide what he wants to put back on it.... also, the DVD drive is working!!!
I greatly appreciate your assistance, Thanks again...
I guess we can cosider this issue 'Solved' and complete! Thanks.....

[rshaffer61]

Congratulations. for a successful resolution for your issue.

You are very welcome. I'm glad we could help and please let us know how everything works out for you.
If there is anything else we can do to help please feel free to ask. I appreciate that you allowed me to assist you with your issue and for your patience.
Thank you for choosing GeeksToGo for help.
This issue now appears to be resolved.