I can't even get scandisk to run!!!!!!

OK - so here's the story.

I just finished school and moved back home 'til i find a job. My family has a:

Dell 2100 series
1.1 GHz Celeron (i know!)
256 Mb RAM
20 Gb HD
running Win ME (i know!!!)

So i try to use this computer, and it is seriously dragging. Besides doing 1000 other things to speed it up, i checked when the last time the HD had been defragged. It had been 830 days since a successful defrag! So i try to defrag it, and i am told there are errors on the disk surface.

I run a thorough check with scandisk, and eventually i get the "scandisk has restarted 10 times..." error. I have control-alt-deleted everything out of the running programs besides systray and explorer. I have shut off the power management and screensaver and virus protection during the scan. I let scandisk run and it eventually locks up and dies while checknig clusters.

What the hell!

Anybody have any ideas on how i can at least get scandisk to finish so i know how screwed this drive actually is???

Is it even worth it???

Why did microsoft even release Win ME?!?!?!? (sorry, venting)

Thanks a lot!

-sonocide6

 

Can't help you with the scandisk problem but try these 3. Check the standard defaults on all 3 before actually running them. They wipe all cookies, history, etc., by default. Your family may lose some stuff they want to keep (like URL's visited), before you wipe all.
Cleaners.

Download/install and run all 3. All are free and don't conflict with each other.

Each finds stuff the other 2 miss.
Cleanup! www.stevengould.org/
(turn the volume right up, for a laugh), together with
CrapCleaner,
aka CCleaner http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=4191
and EmpTemp http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=1575 ,

as a 3 pronged attack on stuff accumulated after every net session.

I have been using these 3, all FREE, for ages now.

While checking out MG for an uninstall program, I came across
Cleanup! from http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=990

This one you have to PAY $$$ for.
Same title, even to the !,different program, different author, from the first link above.

Run Cleanup! from Steven Gould, first. It will show you exactly how many files/crap it deletes and how much space is saved. It also keeps a running total, each time you run it. BTW, how much free space have you, on your 20 gig HDD? Bazza

PS: Forgot to add. Welcome to MG. Baz

 

There's about 6 Gb free.

I already have Ccleaner and have used it. I will try the other 2.

Though these will "clean things up" ... i still want a way to know how sick the drive actually is!

-sonocide6

 

PS: Ignore my reply below . You are already in the "hardware" section.
Duuuhh.

Sorry I can't assist on your scandisk problem. Other MG'ers, please step in. Bazza
PS: maybe start a thread in the "hardware" section, cross refer back to this thread.
Hardware experts may come up with something. Baz
===

 

First we need to now what type oy drive it is. download this utility and click on the icon that says drives. |MG| Free Download - PC Wizard 2005 1.65

second here are a list of drive utilities for the three major harddrive manufactures, since it is a dell it might be a maxtor drive but check any way. |MG| Free Download - Maxtor Powermax 4.09
|MG| Free Download - Seagate SeaTools 3.02.03en
|MG| Free Download - Western Digital DLG Diagnostics 1.1

Third you will download which utility you need and follow instructions, musr drive utilities you will make a cdrom and boot the computer with the cdrom in your drive, you will have to make sure your cdrom is first to boot. To do this you will go into the computer bios by pressing F2 or delete when you first turn the computer on. Look in boot sequence and select cdrom first to boot then the harddrive. After that put in the cdrom disk you made from the drive utility and restart the computer. This should try to repair any bad sectors on your drive .