Can't get past blue screen to run CHKDSK/F

My dad turned his computer (Windows XP, Laptop) on and all you get is the blue screen telling you "A problem has been detected and windows has been shut down to prevent damage to your computer. Further down it says to Run CHDSK/F to check for hard drive corruption, and then restart your computer. I can't get past the screen to run anything. It doesn't boot up on last known good configuration or safe mode. He doesn't have the installation cd's for us to boot from and we don't know where to go from here. Anyone have any ideas on what we can do next?

 

I assume it won't boot into safe mode? If it does, choose "Safemode with command prompt" and at the C: prompt type:

%systemroot%\system32\restore\rstrui.exe

and hit return. Wait - it can take 5 minutes or longer, but the restore window should eventually open. Choose a restore point from before the problem started. If you have never altered the Restore feature, then there should be a number of available restore points.

If you can't boot into safe mode, you might want to check into the "Ultimate Boot CD" that is listed in software at Major Geeks . . . I've been given to understand it contains several diagnostic programs that may be of use to you:

http://majorgeeks.com/Ultimate_Boot_CD_UBCD_d4981.html

Or Hirens boot CD which also contains some freeware diagnostic programs, among other things. At one time their CD contained some stuff that was not freeware, but since then it seem they are now legit. Here is a link to a thread last year talking about it, with a link to their site:

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=193595

I hope this is of use to you in solving the problem. Let us know how it goes

 

Sorry, I read over where you stated it won't boot into safe mode . . .

If the boot disks fail, another option is to obtain a WinXP installation CD from someone, and try a system repair. It is possible to repair the system files, while leaving user created files intact. I've never tried it on a laptop, but have done it several times on desktops. It would have to be the same version of XP that is loaded on the laptop for it to work.

If you can obtain a CD, let me know and I can outline how to proceed with it.

 

You might also pull the hard drive and install it as a secondary (not boot) drive in another computer, then run chkdsk /r from there. chkdsk /r is more thorough than chkdsk /f alone. And note the space between chkdsk and the "/".

 

Thank you both for responding, I've been away for the holidays.

I downloaded the "Ultimate Boot CD", burnt it to a disk, but now I'm not sure how to proceed. When I put it in the computer it just sits on a screen with BIOS, System, Reboot, ect... nothing happens. Not sure if I'm missing something? I started with the first link you gave me before I move on to the second. Pretty clueless here.

He's not sure what version he had, maybe Professional he said. Not sure where we would find cd's anyway.

@ Digerati...he doesn't want to open anything up to get to the hard drive for fear of messing something up even more. Thanks for the suggestion though.

 

I don't think the UBCD can run a chkdsk. I was just going through this in another thread because the XP partition is NTFS and chkdsk is a microsoft licensed program.

I would try to run the recovery console. Here is a downloadable ISO file. Burn that to disc as an image file using imgburn or similar burning software. Boot from it. Select R for repair. It should find your windows installation let you sign into it and then you can run chkdsk /r. (recovery console does not use the /f but uses /r which includes /f)

How to use recovery console (skip the install part you are not doing that but later it shows you how to log in to it. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307654

 

Alright, followed the instructions, ran the chkdsk /r, it said it found errors and repaired them. Then I typed exit and when windows tries to start it goes back to the blue screen. I tried all the steps again and it didn't find anything the second time, but I'm still stuck with the same screen and message. Any more suggestions or should he break down and take it to a repair place?

 

At what point does it fail? And what does the BSOD say? It should have both a text message and a Stop Error number.