NTFS4DOS

Calnefoxile · April 22, 2012, 10:41:04 AM

Guys,

Has anyone used this product??? I know its a bit old, but it's perfect for what I want.

Basically, my mate bought his son's laptop round for me to have a look at as it was freezing after a couple of minutes.

After I'd replaced the keyboard, as it had a huge dent in it (god knows how it got that!!!), because I thought that maybe the keyboard was shorting out to the motherboard. It still freezes when in normal mode of windows, seems fine in Safe Mode!!!!

So I decided to rebuild the machine from the boot partition, oh forgot to say its a Win7 Toshiba Satellite, and this is where my dramas have started

The flaming thing kept freezing during the installation and now I can't get it to restart the installation. I've even tried rebuilding with a copy of XP, just to get it up and running and then try the WIN7 rebuild again. But I can't even get XP to build either, I keep getting the 'blue screen of death'.

So. methinks, I'll use my boot anything floppy that I've had for years, forgetting that Win7 is NTFS and not FAT

and so I cannot run CHKDSK. So off to the internet and I come across NTFS4DOS, which seems perfect for what I want.

Right, so I now have a bootable floppy that allows me to see the partitions, but when I try to get the CHKDSKG to run, which I believe is a graphical version, I am getting, what I can only describe as, multicoloured interference on the screen.

Is this right??? or am I doing something wrong??

Sorry for the long diatribe, but it's driving me potty now. After all this I think the Hard Drive may be FUBAR'd, but I'd like to prove it.

TIA

Neal.

MikeDunn · April 22, 2012, 10:55:10 AM

It's a decent product; not used it for some years, but it should still work with Win7.

Puzzled why you're trying CHKDSKG - remove the G ! You're in a DOS shell, why attempt a GUI ? Not that my version has it (and it's the Ultimate version).

Try FSUTIL DIRTY QUERY C: (assuming C: is the boot drive). Then CHKDSK C: /r (answer Y if queried) to fix any dirty aspects. Once completed (may take an absolute age !), let it reboot & do the FSUTIL again to make sure the drive isn't dirty anymore.

If the HDD is indeed FUBAR - make sure you keep hold of it & see if you can 'see' it when the lappie has a new drive installed & Win7 back on - you may be able to recover the data for him. You can get enclosures to plug drives into & connect via USB for this.

Mike

Calnefoxile · April 22, 2012, 11:00:07 AM

Mike,

Thanks for that buddy.

I'll try it, the other issue is I don't have a Win7 disc, and he didn't do the recovery discs either, so I'll just have to put XP on and then get him to buy the Win7 upgrade.

Unless I can clone the disk???

Cheers

Neal.

Calnefoxile · April 22, 2012, 11:25:15 AM

Mike,

I cannot find FSUTIL on any of my Boot Floppys, I tried copying it from my PC, but it won't run under DOS!!!

When I run CHKDSK I get the following on the screen:

Any ideas???

Cheers

Neal.

Sprintex · April 22, 2012, 12:49:26 PM

Can't help with the specific query as all that stuff above may as well be written in ancient Greek to me

Just to say - Toshiba Satellite - oh dear $:-\$ My misses had one and it gave her nothing but trouble!

Paul

Malc · April 22, 2012, 02:31:20 PM

If the laptop booted in "safe mode" then the disk should be OK. Safe mode is just normal windows without most of the IO drivers. On my Toshiba, there was an option to boot into a recovery mode, where you could restore the default setup from a hidden partition on the hard drive. Unfortunately I can't remember the key press. Look at the screen carefully as the bios boots. Sometimes the delete key is held down, but it depends on the bios.

Malc

Calnefoxile · April 22, 2012, 02:57:53 PM

Quote from: Malc on April 22, 2012, 02:31:20 PM
If the laptop booted in "safe mode" then the disk should be OK. Safe mode is just normal windows without most of the IO drivers. On my Toshiba, there was an option to boot into a recovery mode, where you could restore the default setup from a hidden partition on the hard drive. Unfortunately I can't remember the key press. Look at the screen carefully as the bios boots. Sometimes the delete key is held down, but it depends on the bios.

Malc

Malc,

Thanks for that, thats what I did first off, purely on the basis that you described. My thoughts were exactly the same, boots and runs in Safe Mode - therefore disk must be ok.

But when I tried to rebuild it using the Recovery Tool, F8 by the way, it kept freezing as per running in 'Normal' Windoews mode.

I'll keep trying for some sort of 'hidden' key.

Thanks for all the advice so far, it's a great help. But if someone can diagnose the code in the photo, I would be grateful.

Cheers

Neal.

MikeDunn · April 22, 2012, 04:53:52 PM

When you boot via NTFS4DOS, you should be able to establish contact with the NTFS partition - go to C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32 as that's where it lives.

Mike

Malc · April 22, 2012, 06:21:03 PM

The error in the window appears to be from autochk exe. This seems to be called by the chkdsk. As far as I remember, autochk is the app that starts when windows boots and looks to see if a disk check is needed. When you have booted the dos, can you see the autochk.exe in the windows/system32 directory?

If Fdisk is on the dos boot disk, just blat the drive and start again.

EtchedPixels · April 22, 2012, 08:06:51 PM

I'd start by making a bootable image of memtest86 and leaving it run for a few hours. That'll show up any memory problems (often the cause of random crashing) and to some extent check the CPU and cooling are ok.

No idea on NTFS4DOS. Generally I use Linux boxes to inspect dead WIndows systems and make sure I don't catch anything nasty in the process