Hard-drive corruption question

Thanks propman for your suggestions - I have recovered the data.
I found out there was a newer version than I had downloaded of UBCD4Win so
downloaded that one. It took 4 tries to create the UBCD4Win boot CD from
various Windows XP disks, OEM, Upgrade, too low a SP version and Server
2003! Finally realized my antivirus was stopping one of the files.
I put only the bad disk into the system and booted to UBCD4Win and chose the
NTFS4DOS utility which recognized the disk and gave it a drive letter! From
this I was able to run a chkdsk which repaired errors. I then put the good
drive back into the system so I could boot from it and I can now see all of
the files on the (formerly) bad drive in Explorer.
Which now takes me back to the cause of the problem. Why on earth would
installing a new AGP video card in an otherwise perfectly functioning
machine cause such insidious corruption of the hard drive?
I have learned my lesson - backups, backups, backups!
Mich

"M Skabialka" wrote in message
...
I actually found and downloaded BartsPE over the weekend and using a Vista
machine (and the WinXP CD) tried to create a boot CD, but it stopped when
it reached 4 errors. I will try again on an XP machine.

I did some testing with Avira NTFS4DOS and if I didn't use DIR on the
entire folder it worked OK. Just for testing I renamed ntfs.sys on a
Win2K disk and rebooted - it asked for the Win2K disk to repair the
missing file. I then went back and renamed it back.
But on the bad drive I couldn't even get to the file because it couldn't
ID the disk drive letter and called it ?: instead of C: so I couldn't
change to that drive.

Hopefully Barts PE will allow me to recover the user files on the drive,
then I'll reformat it. The Western Digital diagnostics says nothing is
wrong with it, but I do have an RMA to return it for replacement which
I'll probably do.

Mich

"propman" wrote in message
...
As I mentioned in a previous message, this program dumped out on me
several time with a stack overflow message so I didn't waste any more
time on it. Personally I think your best bet would be either to try
accessing the disk via one of the linux distro's or UBCD4Win. Don't know
if you saw my other message concerning the latter so here is the info
again:

http://ubcd4win.com/

quote on

UBCD4Win is based on Bart's PE©. Bart's PE© builds a Windows®
"pre-install" environment CD, basically a simple Windows® XP booted from
CD. UBCD4Win includes network support and allows you the ability to
modify NTFS volumes, recover deleted files, create new NTFS volumes, scan
hard drives for viruses, etc. Our download includes almost everything you
need to repair your system problems. This project has been put together
to be the ultimate recovery cd and not a replacement OS (Operating
System). Please visit the "List of Tools" page for a complete list of
what is included in the latest version of UBCD4Win.

quote off

Thanks propman for your suggestions - I have recovered the data.
I found out there was a newer version than I had downloaded of UBCD4Win so
downloaded that one. It took 4 tries to create the UBCD4Win boot CD from
various Windows XP disks, OEM, Upgrade, too low a SP version and Server
2003! Finally realized my antivirus was stopping one of the files.
I put only the bad disk into the system and booted to UBCD4Win and chose the
NTFS4DOS utility which recognized the disk and gave it a drive letter! From
this I was able to run a chkdsk which repaired errors. I then put the good
drive back into the system so I could boot from it and I can now see all of
the files on the (formerly) bad drive in Explorer.
Which now takes me back to the cause of the problem. Why on earth would
installing a new AGP video card in an otherwise perfectly functioning
machine cause such insidious corruption of the hard drive?
I have learned my lesson - backups, backups, backups!
Mich

"M Skabialka" wrote in message
...
I actually found and downloaded BartsPE over the weekend and using a Vista
machine (and the WinXP CD) tried to create a boot CD, but it stopped when
it reached 4 errors. I will try again on an XP machine.

I did some testing with Avira NTFS4DOS and if I didn't use DIR on the
entire folder it worked OK. Just for testing I renamed ntfs.sys on a
Win2K disk and rebooted - it asked for the Win2K disk to repair the
missing file. I then went back and renamed it back.
But on the bad drive I couldn't even get to the file because it couldn't
ID the disk drive letter and called it ?: instead of C: so I couldn't
change to that drive.

Hopefully Barts PE will allow me to recover the user files on the drive,
then I'll reformat it. The Western Digital diagnostics says nothing is
wrong with it, but I do have an RMA to return it for replacement which
I'll probably do.

Mich

"propman" wrote in message
...
As I mentioned in a previous message, this program dumped out on me
several time with a stack overflow message so I didn't waste any more
time on it. Personally I think your best bet would be either to try
accessing the disk via one of the linux distro's or UBCD4Win. Don't know
if you saw my other message concerning the latter so here is the info
again:

http://ubcd4win.com/

quote on

UBCD4Win is based on Bart's PE©. Bart's PE© builds a Windows®
"pre-install" environment CD, basically a simple Windows® XP booted from
CD. UBCD4Win includes network support and allows you the ability to
modify NTFS volumes, recover deleted files, create new NTFS volumes, scan
hard drives for viruses, etc. Our download includes almost everything you
need to repair your system problems. This project has been put together
to be the ultimate recovery cd and not a replacement OS (Operating
System). Please visit the "List of Tools" page for a complete list of
what is included in the latest version of UBCD4Win.

quote off