Help/Support ► tech help... :x

[Goldpanner]

Ok... so basically I need some help with my laptop and I know very little about computers and I'm hoping someone here will know something that can help...


Every time I tried to save a file, open certain files, or download a file, I was getting this message: 'The disk structure is corrupted and unreadable'. It's stopped doing it now, but it scared the shit out of me. I googled lots of things and all of it told me to reboot, but I'm too scared to do that in case my computer won't turn on again. So I've compressed all my important files into a .rar and want to put it somewhere before I try, but it's like 6GB and I can't find a place to upload it :c Well, I'd rather back up, buuut:

I do have a portable hard drive, and a few USBs, but my computer won't recognise them. It makes a sound when they are plugged in, not the normal do-DUP sound but this weird low dun-dun-dun sound. It makes the normal sound when I unplug them, though. But, they won't show up on My Computer and in Device Manager they have a yellow triangle sign.

(Some programs still won't open either, including my webcam program and itunes. I've tried to update iTunes but it keeps failing)

Maybe all of this is a waste of time anyway. I just don't want to reboot before I can save stuff because I'm scared.

I'm defragging right now but is there anything else I could do?

I'm on a 2.5 year old Toshiba laptop, OS is Windows Vista Home Edition, I use Google Chrome... my virus protections are Windows Security Essentials and I also have superantispyware but I think that's a bit different. I don't know much else about my computer, sorry...


um

if you can't help me and wasted your time reading this, i'm sorry, have a song

 

[ChaoticHeart]

Malwarebytes : Free anti-malware, anti-virus and spyware removal download Try this, if it dosen't work I'd reccomend formatting your hard drive, hopefully you don't anything too important on your laptop.

 

[Deleted member 36435]

back up important shit then format dat hard drive

 

[Professor Ven]

back up important shit then format dat hard drive

is true though format only if you're not going to lose anything important to you.

run scans (this will take a long time more than likely) using multiple virus/malware/trojan scanners;


if those don't work try to save/backup your impertinent stuff and reformat that harddrive

 

[Goldpanner]

Thanks guys. I'm going to try backing up to another computer through an ethernet cable, seeing as none of my external drives will recognise, then I'll try reformatting :3

 

[ChaoticHeart]

Thanks guys. I'm going to try backing up to another computer through an ethernet cable, seeing as none of my external drives will recognise, then I'll try reformatting :3

Make sure the other computer has all it's antivirus stuff

 

[Goldpanner]

Aw man, good point. (Though... it's not my computer...)

One more question: is it okay to just use Windows default backup program? Or is there a better one to download? I use defrag and disk cleanup programs from piriform that are much better than the Windows defaults, but idk, is this like that too?

 

[Lancelot]

I was going to suggest running "chkdsk" to see if there are any sectors in the HD that are turning up as bad, and see what happens. Still, backup is the best idea right now.

Um... I'm pretty sure Windows Backup only does it over CDs. Did your portable HD not come with any backup programs?

 

[Goldpanner]

Oh, I did run chkdsk! But it said I had to reboot before it would do anything and I was too scared to reboot. Now at least I can see my files and do things; my brother had a similar problem, and when he tried to reboot it wouldn't turn on again and then he lost everything. But I have a feeling my computer is not as bad and I'm just being paranoid lol

I have Vista Home Edition and it lets me select either a device or a network to save the backup to, I think if I fiddle around it will let me save it to the other computer using my internet cord under 'network'. I can't remember if my portable HD came with a backup program but I think it didn't. It's As I said, my laptop won't recognise my portable HD or my memory sticks anyway so it's hard to check. It makes a fail noise when I plug them in, and they don't show up in My Computer, and have yellow triangles in Device Manager.

 

[Lancelot]

That's odd that chkdsk wants to reboot first o-o it's still something to be concerned about, though.

That being the case... I'd say just try the ethernet connection, then. It's a pity it won't recognize the other devices, though. If you're willing to, on the ones that are caution'd, try the Search for Updates or w/e it may be called option and see if that at least gets them working again. I'd say perhaps try even uninstalling those drivers, but that would require a reboot to take effect/reinstall the drivers correctly.

 

[Goldpanner]

Google told me it happens if 'the drive is in the boot partition' but I have no clue what that means D:

And yeah, I will try that, that sounds like a good idea! But first I will have to try the backup thing, and before that I'm running virus/malware scans. So it will take a while... bah

So my plan so far:
1. finish scans
2. see if back up works
IF BACK UP WORKS
3. try to fix drivers
4. reboot
5. run chkdsk again
6. reformat harddrive <--last resort (scared... never done it)
IF BACK UP WON'T WORK
3. ignore everything because I can save and download things again? ??

...orz

 

[Lancelot]

Generally when sectors fail, the hard drive itself isn't able to be repaired, but still usable to some extent (much like my laptop's current HD).

Anyway, according to Wiki:

The boot partition is the disk partition that contains the Windows operating system files and its support files, but not any files responsible for booting.

So either it's just that Windows didn't fully boot up properly, orrrr... it's screwed? XD; I don't know, now.

 

[Azurith]

Generally when sectors fail, the hard drive itself isn't able to be repaired, but still usable to some extent (much like my laptop's current HD).

Anyway, according to Wiki:



So either it's just that Windows didn't fully boot up properly, orrrr... it's screwed? XD; I don't know, now.

This error can be caused by numerous sources. Anything from bumping the system during use, degradation over time, and shutting down improperly. (Since windows tries to write some files at shutdown, which is why it isn't recommended to unplug a computer that is on.)

So one of two things is likely occuring:

1. The filesystem structure is corrupted. The simplest means to fix this specific problem is backing up critical data then run a chkdsk /r (repair) or performing a full/low level format and reinstall of the OS.
More information on chkdsk can be found here:
CHKDSK - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The reason chkdsk wants to restart is that it has to control strict access to the drive during the test. In other words, the system doesn't like other programs trying to access the drive and changing data during the test. If chkdsk is unable to lock the drive, it will run the scan on the next boot before any other program can access the drive. The /r component tells it to attempt to recover any bad sectors/files. Some may be non-recoverable.

Here is an alternative way to chkdsk:
Check your hard disk for errors

If these two fail, then you likely have physical damage to the drive. It would be imperative to backup immediately and get a replacement drive or check if the drive is still warrantied. Basically it can be a sign that the drive is about to fail or has started failing.

Eventually all drives fail.

Even USB/flash drives and SSD drives fail, but are less likely to fail due to "shock" (ie, bumps & falls). The flash & ssd drives are more likely to fail from high I/O (write/read) sequences but a standard (non-SSD) drive is less likely to fail this way. The SSDs are only able to rewrite the same area a limited # of times, but it is usually in the millions or billions per storage area so most users won't see a drive error for many, many years with these types of drives.