Alternatives to ChkDsk?

Multiple times now Windows XP/SP3 has run ChkDsk on different computers ending in a complete crash or bigger problems than before the check requiring me to revert to an Acronis True Image backup copy (which I now update frequently).

The attached pic shows an example of the error I'm currently getting, but that's likely related to a recent repartitioning I did. The ones before a crash usually involve messages like these:

"CHKDSK is verifying files (Stage 1 of 3)...
Deleting corrupt attribute record (128, "")
from file record segment 310869.
CHKDSK is verifying files (Stage 1 of 3)...
Deleting corrupt attribute record (128, "")
from file record segment 326376."
[the volume may or may not be identified as dirty or raw when this happens - I know command prompt identified C: as dirty when checked it before the last crash.]

I check for viruses and malware on a regular basis, and Rising provides active protection. I have three computers linked in a network with file sharing, and internet connection sharing enabled on one of the computers through a USB netlink cable, so maybe that's contributing to these issues.

On one of the computers my CD/DVD burning programs stopped working (BurnAware, CDBurnerXP, and others I assume... - they report an SCSI pass-through interface I/O error), but the other still burns fine despite the ChkDsk issues.

What should I do? Is there anything better than ChkDsk to fix errors on WinXP?

 

On Edge
I just joined this forum today and have the same problem you do. Any responses yet?

 

UPDATE: My CD/DVD Burner works again. For anyone with a similar problem, here are the steps I took, though some of them may have been unnecessary (I made backups of all concerned drivers, restarted Windows between steps, kept very up-to-date backups, etc...):

[0. Tried cleaning the computer, tightening/checking wires, etc. but this wasn't the problem.]

1. I removed my virtual CD/DVD drives (uninstalled Daemon Tools Pro).

2. I entered BIOS (F1 during start-up for my HP Pavilion), and set my CD/DVD drive (Secondary Master) to default/auto settings - I tried tweaking with the BIOS settings to no avail, and almost created more problems/few scrares...

3. I entered Device Manager, and uninstalled (and reinstalled prior to reboot) my IDE Adapter driver (this probably didn't help).

4. a) SIGNIFICANT: I uninstalled the drivers for my CD/DVD drive and it's SCSI Adapter, rebooted and let Windows find the devices and do the auto reinstall.
b) Prior to a second required reboot, I updated the firmware for the CD/DVD drive. [I had attempted the update many times before, but it kept failing. In hindsight, I should probably have rebooted first, and that might have been enough anyway.

That was that. I'm still trying to update my motherboard BIOS, but keep getting "system BIOS' hook not found" or something along those lines.

 

No responses. I've googled this too, and one possibility is a failing ("dirty") drive, which I doubt explains my problems since the drive works fine after each backup restore.

I'll update this thread if I ever find out the root problem, but that's unlikely to happen anytime soon.

In the absence of a definitive solution, I'm keeping up-to-date Acronis backups of my C: partition, while trying to weed out smaller problems here and there (such as the BIOS update problem, figuring out why UndeletePlus "cannot load MFT" for my C: partition and so forth...

 

Since it appears there's no alternative to ChkDsk that could solve this problem, is there a way to run ChkDsk and then selectively recover the vital system files that it deletes (assuming one can still boot to Windows)?

In particular, I ran ChkDsk on my Laptop today (after tedious backups). Result: Windows ran, but I effectively lost my Admin privileges under both the Administrator and [my user name] accounts. Most of the important system process went down such as RPC, and Windows wouldn't let me restart them. Most of the Administrative Services and User Profile functions from Control Panel didn't work (or I wasn't given access). I couldn't even move the icons around on my Desktop screen. After many lost hours trying to fix it, I had to go back to my Acronis backup image of C: I still think I have to eventually run ChkDsk again, anyone know a way to cleanup the post-ChkDsk damage of the kind described above without undoing the legitimate(??) corrections it needs to do?