Read Disc Error

D

Danimalist

Member
First, I'm offended that anyone would equate Vista with Longhorn!
I've got a Toshiba Satellite A135-S4467. The other night while editing a word doc, it suddenly shut down after briefly flashing a long warning message that there was not time to read. Since then, I've gotten the "Read disc error...press control-alt-delete.." message when I restart.
I'm in Cambodia, so I don't have my Vista discs. I downloaded the Recovery disc. After searching for Windows installations, it says "Windows found problems with your computer's startup options." Then, "Do you want to apply repairs to restart your computer?"
I "view details" and see:
The following startup options will be added:
Name: Windows Vista (TM) Home Premium (Recovered)
Path: Windows
Windows Device: Partition= C (151126MB)
When I press "repair and restart" a System Recovery dialogue box says "Failed to save startup options."
I then press "next" and go to "startup repair" which gives me this message: "Startup repair cannot repair this computer automatically'"
I "view problem details" which include "Problem Signature 06: Missing Boot manager" and "Problem Signature 09: WRPrepair"
I also tried system restore (through the command console), but it says there are no restore points.
Somewhere I also got the message "Boot manager is missing or corrupt"

Ïn addition I've tried bootrec.exe with /Fixboot and /Fixmbr, it says it fixes it but the problem remains.
I've also tried /RebuildBcd. It scans and finds one Windows installation, but when I choose to "add installation to build list" it says "The requested system device cannot be found."
Finally, I've tried "bcdedit/export C:\BCD_Backup" but it says the system cannot find the path specified.

To add to my woes, it has suddenly started beeping about every 20 seconds!

Any suggestions would be appreciated.
 
Hi Dani, welcome to NST.
Sorry to hear of your woes. (Don't these things always happen at the most inconvenient time/place !)
It sounds like you need to do a bit of repairing to the disk before trying to repair the boot again, from the recovery disk console, rather than the OS run command as in these MS instructions.
Manual steps to run Chkdsk at the command prompt

  1. Click Start, and then Run.
  2. In Open, type cmd, and then press ENTER.
  3. Use one of the following procedures:
    • To run Chkdsk in read-only mode, at the command prompt, type chkdsk, and then press ENTER.
    • To repair errors without scanning the volume for bad sectors, at the command prompt, type chkdsk volume:/f, and then press ENTER.

      Note If one or more of the files on the hard disk are open, you will receive the following message: Chkdsk cannot run because the volume is in use by another process. Would you like to schedule this volume to be checked the next time the system restarts? (Y/N)
      Type Y, and then press ENTER to schedule the disk check, and then restart your computer to start the disk check.
    • To repair errors, locate bad sectors, and recover readable information, at the command prompt, type chkdsk volume:/r, and then press ENTER.
When it's fixed whatever it can, try the boot repair again.
 
Try last known good configuration and safe mode if you continue to have problems. Go to the advanced options tab in system properties and select startup and recovery. Uncheck the box to automatically restart on system failure so you have the chance to get the extact details of the blue screen in the future.
 
Thank you both for your suggestions. I was able to run chkdsk/f/r c:. After that, the recovery disk was able to find windows but couldn't repair it. So, I'm back in the US now and just bought a rocketfish usb enclosure. Most of my data is fine, but there are several files (docs and pics) that are corrupt. But, overall, nothing major. Now, before I put the harddrive back into my laptop and reload windows, I'd like to check it to make sure it's not a physical problem. Any suggestions on free software to use? If there is a problem, any suggestions on a good cheap hard drive.
Thanks again!
 
Welcome back Dani.
Once you've extracted everything useful from the HDD, run a full format of the entire disk (not a quick format). It'll take hours but it should permanently remove from use any corrupt areas of the disk surface.
Then go to the website of the HDD OEM and search for disk checking software. They mostly have free "disk fitness" utilities (or some such name), which will run on their own hardware but not other makes.
That should tell you whether your HDD is fit for another few years of use, or just for the bin.
A froogle or kelkoo search on "xxxGb hard disk" should find you a few bargains if necessary.
 
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