WindowsXP Gurus - I Need Your Help

[savedbygrace]

I need help. Out of the blue, my WindowsXP (SP2) system has gone crazy. It is frequently giving me a warning message in the System Tray that says:

Windows - Delayed Write Failed Windows was unable to save all the data for the file D:/$BitMap. The data has been lost. This error may be caused by a failure of your computer hardware or network connection. Please try to save this file elsewhere.

That file is apparently hidden, but revealing hidden files doesn't show it.

My WinXP volume is on C:/ and the D:/ drive volume is for data files.

I've googled for help, and done everything that Microsoft and others have suggested. Nothing helps. This began suddenly.

Any ideas? Any other info you need before you can help me?

Thanks.

[mad_as_he$$]

Concur. Back that thing up right now and get a new HD. Do not shut it down you may not get a solid restart.

[roamer_1]

I’d take a lot of the tech advice on a political board with a grain of salt. Like a lot of the singers on American Idol think they can sing a lot better than they actually can, so do computer users generally over estimate there understanding of whats going on inside that box.

I do it for a living, and I specialize in soft recovery of hard drives and virus removal/recovery.

It is the paramount concern when creating a backup to get the data off the box (and preferably off the site). For those of us with multiple machines and off site FTP, it is part of the normal course.

For the average joe or power user, a USB external drive makes for a very affordable solution. Here's a reference for the average guy on how to back up (shameless plug, authored by me):

The F@t Guy: How to Back up all my Junk

[ToryNotion]

Sorry. I wasn’t directing that at your or your advice. Just a general statement about the general level of technical knowledge one finds on a political board. I’m a computer professional as well. I know how difficult it is to communicate about technical problems and really get to the root cause and find a solution.

[laker_dad]

Wow, plenty of expert advice...
You may now change your screen name to “savedbyFR”...

[savedbygrace]

This is bizarre. This morning, I was forced by circumstances to boot up the PC so I could print some checks from Quicken and QuickBooks Pro.

Absolutely NO warning windows popping up.

I’ve kept the system on for a couple of hours now, working in the usual collection of apps, all loaded at the same same, just like I usually work on this computer.

Still no warning pop ups.

I’m not stupid enough to believe there is suddenly no problem, and just smart enough to go ahead and replace the D: drive anyway.

But it is totally a brain fryer that there have been no warning pop ups at all in more than two hours today.

Here’s my thinking: One of the steps I took yesterday afternoon required a reboot before its results could be seen, and the reboot only happened this morning. Hosever, I can’t recall what that step might be.

Or, one of the many chkdsk runs I made on D: finally fixed the offending bad sector.

[savedbygrace]

What, six days before my 10th anniversary date on FR, and you want me to give it up by changing my screen name?

Get out of town.

;-)

(just kidding, LD)

[jdm]

Or, one of the many chkdsk runs I made on D: finally fixed the offending bad sector.

Yes, chkdsk may have solved your issue.

[Gone_Postal]

1 question is your D drive a USB connection....
if so just unplugging the usb cable while the machine is running may cause the problem....by rebooting the computer (with or without unplugging the usb cable) will also fix the problem..

[roamer_1]

Or, one of the many chkdsk runs I made on D: finally fixed the offending bad sector.

My thinking:

Bad sectors do not suddenly get better. That leads me to believe the problem is at the partition level. I still would not trust the drive.

Back up your data.
Run manufacturer specific hdd utility.
if OK, CONTINUE:
Delete the offending partition.
Repartition and format and copy data back on.

Optionally, if there are no other partitions, use the zero-write utility to zero the drive rather than deleting the partition. This step takes a very long time on a big drive, but will set the data area back to factory specs.

How big is this drive?

[savedbygrace]

If that’s the case, then the reason I was unable to resolve this before creating this thread is that I didn’t know you have to keep running chkdsk, that it doesn’t fix everything the first time ‘round.

Sheesh.

[jdm]

I think you meant that for savedbygrace.

[savedbygrace]

D: drive is inside the case, connected to one of the channels of an ATA133 card.

[savedbygrace]

I am replacing the drive later today. The replacement arrived a little while ago, and it’s still cold. After it gets up to room temp, I’ll get to work on swapping it in.

But now that everything is working without warning pop ups, I won’t know if this resolves the problem or not. I hate it when a problem goes away in the middle of troubleshooting.

[savedbygrace]

I said fixed when I meant marked bad. chkdsk DOES mark bad sectors, doesn’t it?

[roamer_1]

But now that everything is working without warning pop ups, I won’t know if this resolves the problem or not. I hate it when a problem goes away in the middle of troubleshooting.

The new drive will fix it. If you care to keep the old one, do the testing I described above to prove it. Then hang it in an external case (about $35) and you will have a nice backup spot.

[roamer_1]

I said fixed when I meant marked bad. chkdsk DOES mark bad sectors, doesn’t it?

Yes, but that would be scary bad- all the "$Files" are right in the front of the drive. Not a good place or the drive to be going bad. That is why I would suggest a run through with a drive utility if you want to try to keep it.

It is quite likely that NT just screwed up the partition... It is known to do that.

[roamer_1]

PS: if the drive is a SAMSUNG throw it over your shoulder and buy no more... Seagate/Maxtor are best, hitachi (IBM) and Western Digital are OK...

[js1138]

It is quite likely that NT just screwed up the partition... It is known to do that.

Interesting. I've been using NT and its successors since 1995, both at home and in corporations having thousands of PCs. I've never seen a case of NTFS losing data on a drive that had not failed physically.

[dubie]

http://www.acronis.com do a disk clone. I love acronis, they really make it easy... if you have sectors going, it won’t be long before more go... why take the risk...

[roamer_1]

I've never seen a case of NTFS losing data on a drive that had not failed physically.

I get them all the time- especially after crossing the 137g mark. Often times, if there is a system part. and a data part., one can delete the system part. and then data will reappear.

This happens often with laptops, and is why it is a good idea to partition your data differently.

Another thing I have noticed: I have several clients who have photo shops, and have been experiencing partition crashes on big drives (137+). I mean, I would get 3 or 4 a month for a while there.... very expensive recovery.

Funny thing is, if I set the partition inside an extended partition, the problem seems to go away- go figger.

I think that Win writes to the front of the drive in some way that is faulty, and moving the actual partition into an extended part moves it away from the front enough so that the fault no longer occurs.

I don't know why it works, but it does...