neatnettricks

[Miles B]

My Compaq Evo N610c laptop (Windows XP) has been running increasingly slowly recently, and lately has taken to not starting up properly (you can hear the drive clicking) and also to corrupting files.

When I did finally get it to start up, I backed up the data then ran a defragmenter + CCleaner to remove as much 'dross' as I can; also AdAware + an anti-virus solution.

My (very old) copy of Norton Utilities has so far taken 27 hours to check only 14% of the hard drive, so I guess it's not built for XP!

Does anyone have any suggestions for solid, reliable utilities (preferably free...) that I could run to check and repair the hard drive and, if necessary, rebuild the Registry? I'm not too computer-literate, so if you have any ideas it would help if they were fairly idiot-proof

TIA -


Miles

[drmark]

Miles,

There is really no way to repair a failing hard drive and from what you describe, I am afraid this is the case. The first thing you need to do is backup your computer because when your hard drive fails--and you will have no warning more than you may already be getting--it will be too late and you will lose everything on your computer.

That said, there is a hard drive disc utility built into Windows XP that you can run which will repair certain disc errors--note, not the disc itself.

To use:

Go to My Computer
Right Click on your C (local) Drive
Click on Properties and then Tools
Select Error Checking
Put check marks in both boxes
Click on OK

You will need to reboot your computer and then on reboot you will see a blue screen (no not that blue screen!) appear as it begins to check you drive for errors. This may take an hour or more.

As for a good disc defragmenter I would suggest the FREE and excellent Auslogics program at http://www.auslogics.com/disk-defrag . Depending on th size of your disc and how long it has been since you defragmnented last, it can take a long time. A large disc that has been regularly fragmented can take an average of two to three hours; although, I have seen badly fragmented discs take nine hours or more. However, twenty-seven hours would indicate a problem.

Before you do anything else to your hard drive, however, do another backup of your files. Even running an error check or a defragmentation can put enough stress on your hard drive to cause it to fail if it is already heading in that direction.

Wish I could give you more positive news or help.

Mark

[Miles B]

Thanks, Mark - appreciate your help.

As you advise, I'll back it up again then try the XP tool. Fingers crossed...


Miles