Help !!!

[bvd]

One day I start my computer (running Windows OSR-2) only to discover that the entire system registry was gone. I reboot to run Scandisk, and upon scanning the hard drive's file/directory structure I find that every other directory is corrupted. I let it mark all of the bad allocation units and save the lost file clusters... but since I have to confirm each operation, it is a long process. At one point, the system hangs.

I suspect motherboard failure; could this be it? I know nothing about hardware.

Anyway the BIOS recognizes the hard drive. I decide to reformat the active partition (I had two partitions) after backing up all salvageable data on floppy. It takes a while and the process is interrupted to recover each individual bad sector. I then change my mind; I decide to remove the formated drive, plus an extended partition and its logical drive to create one large partition (I used FDISK from a Windows 98 CD-ROM and implemented FAT32 support.)

I then boot from a (manually-made) system disk that had FORMAT.COM from a Windows 98 machine. Upon reformating the hard drive (using a parameter to transfer system files), I get this garbage:

Invalid or Bad Media at Track 0

Suggestions?

 

[gonzo_for_civ]

Your HD is shot, it's worthless now. I would try swapping in another HD to make sure it isn't your motherboard but if it is, you may have a lot of equipment to replace.

 

[Padma]

Yup, I had that happen to me with a brand new HD a few years back. When you get that error message, you may as well hang it up, 'cause that HD ain't goin' nowhere anymore.

(My HD was "cheerfully replaced", when I took it back.)

 

[Chieftess]

Happened to me too. Luckily, it was in a temporary Win3.1 directory!