Why is the brand/model of the HD important? If I just run defrag it should be right anyway? Or not?

not defrag....you want to run chkdsk /r. The reason you want to be sure is that a lot of those diagnostic tools are designed by the manufacturer for a specific type of drive. So if you can get to DOS, you can then run chkdsk /r, which should repair it enough to boot into windows and then begin the repair process.

The first step is getting TO windows.

Ok, I have got a friend who has burnt it for me. Now I will get the disk on Friday.

Could you please write the steps I have to do once I boot from the disk?

Sorry that I don't understand that well. Thanks for you help so far.

which disk? The ultimate boot disk, or the xp install? Either way, you need to boot from cd. First things first, just pop the cd in there on power up, power down, and then power back up, and watch for a message that says 'press any key to boot from cd'. Press any key, and then it will boot from the cd. If you don't see that message, you need to enter bios and change the boot order. To do so, power down again, and on power up (get your fingers ready) look for a 'press xx to enter setup' where xx usually equals F2, ESC, DEL, or something like that. You will then be taken to the bios screen, whcih is navigable only by keyboard, not by mouse. At the top of the screen, usually, is a list of menus, just like in a windows app. If it's not on the top, you will be able to arrow down. What you are looking for is the 'boot' section. Highlight that, and hit enter, and follow the onscreen instructions (usually using the + or - keys to move selections around) to get the cd to the first boot spot. The machine will then try to boot from the cd first.

As for the rest, I need to know if you are using an xp disk or the ubcd.

Thanks,

v

I am using the UBCD.

EDIT:

Also, there is no chance of loss of data or anything similar to that is there?

anytime you do something like this there is always a chance of losing data. The hard drive has lost functionality, and we need to restore it, so there is always a risk that the hd could get worse, not better. But right now you can't do anything save put it in another machine to get teh data off.

I've not used this before, but I know you need to get into dos, so I would boot using either one of the dos tools, or maybe smart boot manager and try to get to a dos prompt. Once there, you need to type the chkdsk /r (from the dos prompt) and let it run. Once done, remove the cd, reboot, and you *should* be able to get to windows. Then you defrag and we'll run some other diags as well.

The first part, though, is getting you to boot into dos. Let me know what happens, and then we'll go from there.

thanks,

v

I have no idea on how to get it to boot into DOS. I tried Smart Boot manager, but that didn't seem to work. It could boot from the CD, but I don't know how to get into DOS and run chkdsk /r....