No Shutdown or Restart

[Daave]

Thank you

You're welcome. I hope that helps.

 

[D.H. Cesare]

D.H. Cesare:
I may have misconstrued the level of your familiarity & experience with
PC's, thus the last paragraph of my previous post. When you responded that
"I do not know how to do these things. Are they done through the CMD
window? or the RUN box?", presumably referring to my query & suggestion
about running the sfc /scannow & chkdsk commands, I assumed you were an
inexperienced user of PCs and thought that under the circumstances it
would be best for a professional to examine your system. Perhaps your
response was in reference to another comment or suggestion I had made.
Please understand that in any event I meant no offense.

Anyway, since you indicate you are an experienced PC user, have you
considered running a Repair install of the OS? Again, I'm assuming the
possibility of nothing more than a corrupted OS that a Repair install
might correct.

And have you also run the sfc /scannow command I previously suggested?

As I recall I also suggested you check out the HDD with a diagnostic
utility on the off-chance you're dealing with a defective or failing HDD.
Have you done so?

It is conceivable, of course, that a hardware-issue is involved here, but
I would first eliminate the possibility of a corrupted OS or user
mis-configuration being the cause of the problem you're experiencing.

It's good that you maintain backups of your personal data on (I assume) a
current basis. But do you think backing up your "entire system every 6
months or so" to one or more DVDs is really sufficient? Might you not want
to *comprehensively* back up your entire system using a disk-cloning or
disk-imaging program on a more frequent basis than that? But of course,
it's your choice and if it works for you that's all that counts.
Anna

*******
No matter how nice you are, it won't do anything to make me a better
computer user, but thanks anyway.

No one I've ever talked to has ever had any success running a Repair
install,
and the 2 times I tried it, it didn't work.

I only back up my personal files, not the entire system. I never knew
how to back up the entire system, and now that there's so much stuff
on the HDD, I don't think I want to. What would be the value of backing
up all that stuff?

I don't know anything about disk cloning, but I recently purchased an
AEGIS Portable USB drive that came with cloning software.
My drive has 120GB of data on it, wouldn't cloning it create a HUGE file?

I checked my HDD with 2 programs and it's healthy, but I haven't run
scandisk.

 

[Anna]

(SNIP)

No matter how nice you are, it won't do anything to make me a better
computer user, but thanks anyway.

No one I've ever talked to has ever had any success running a Repair
install, and the 2 times I tried it, it didn't work.

I only back up my personal files, not the entire system. I never knew
how to back up the entire system, and now that there's so much stuff
on the HDD, I don't think I want to. What would be the value of backing
up all that stuff?

I don't know anything about disk cloning, but I recently purchased an
AEGIS Portable USB drive that came with cloning software.
My drive has 120GB of data on it, wouldn't cloning it create a HUGE file?

I checked my HDD with 2 programs and it's healthy, but I haven't run
scandisk.

D.H. Cesare:
First of all, as to the Repair install process of the OS...

All I can tell you is that over the years as a computer technician I've had
hundreds of occasions of running a Repair install of the XP OS. Did a
number - even a substantial number - of them fail? Of course they did. No
one that I've ever known has claimed one will achieve anything like 100%
success using this technique. But it *does* work in a substantial number of
cases to bring the system back to a bootable, functional state. It's
generally worth a try in many cases where it appears that a user's problem
*may* be due to a corrupted OS, even when a definitive diagnosis of such
cannot be made at the time.

There's relatively little to lose by running a Repair install even when it
turns out it's unsuccessful. True, in a tiny number of cases (based upon my
experience) there is a risk that further data corruption may occur. And it's
why we generally advise a user (if possible) to copy whatever important data
to some removable media before undertaking a Repair install. Or better yet,
clone the contents of the drive to another drive for 100% (backup) security.

The fact that the Repair install was unsuccessful in your situation does not
in any way (in my opinion) lessen it's usefulness in a variety of
situations.

Anyway, speaking of disk-cloning...

As you may be aware from my past posts on this subject we are strong
advocates of the disk-cloning process for comprehensive backups of one's
system. Simply stated, it's hard to imagine a better backup system for most
PC users than one that creates a precise copy of one's day-to-day working
HDD, including the OS, all programs & applications, and of course all
personal data. So that if & when the day comes when the user's "source" HDD
becomes defective or the OS becomes so corrupted that it is unbootable &
dysfunctional, it's a relatively easy matter to restore the complete system
through the use of the "destination" HDD, i.e., the recipient of the cloned
contents of the source HDD.

Our preferred program for this use is the Casper 5 program, and I have
previously indicated why we prefer this program in a number of posts. Many
users prefer the disk-imaging approach (creating individual files containing
the data contents) to establish & maintain a comprehensive backup system.

In your own situation, had you a clone of your HDD at the time the
problem(s) you related surfaced, might that not have resolved your problem
at least in returning your system to a bootable, functional state? You had
stated at the outset of your posts that "My system had been working
perfectly" before the problem(s) arose.

I'm not familiar with the disk-cloning software you mention that was
included with your recently purchased USBEHD. Perhaps you'll find it useful
so it's certainly worth a try. As to your query questioning whether the
disk-cloning process will create a "huge file". Understand that since we're
talking about a clone of your system (not a disk-image), so as I indicated
above, the clone is a precise copy (for all practical purposes) of your
source HDD. It is not a "file". As such, the amount of disk-space taken up
by the clone will be virtually identical to the contents of your source HDD.
So, for example, if you're cloning a single-partitioned 120 GB HDD that
contains say, 70 GB of total data, the recipient HDD (your USBEHD in this
case) will similarly create a 120 GB partition holding those 70 GB of data.
Or you could create a partition of 80 GB on the external HDD if you wished
to hold the 70 GB of data. Or some disk-cloning programs (Casper 5 is one)
will also provide an option of setting the partition on the destination
drive just sufficient in size to hold the contents of the source HDD, say 70
GB in this example.
Anna

 

[D.H. Cesare]

D.H. Cesare:
First of all, as to the Repair install process of the OS...

All I can tell you is that over the years as a computer technician I've
had hundreds of occasions of running a Repair install of the XP OS. Did a
number - even a substantial number - of them fail? Of course they did. No
one that I've ever known has claimed one will achieve anything like 100%
success using this technique. But it *does* work in a substantial number
of cases to bring the system back to a bootable, functional state. It's
generally worth a try in many cases where it appears that a user's problem
*may* be due to a corrupted OS, even when a definitive diagnosis of such
cannot be made at the time.

There's relatively little to lose by running a Repair install even when it
turns out it's unsuccessful. True, in a tiny number of cases (based upon
my experience) there is a risk that further data corruption may occur. And
it's why we generally advise a user (if possible) to copy whatever
important data to some removable media before undertaking a Repair
install. Or better yet, clone the contents of the drive to another drive
for 100% (backup) security.

The fact that the Repair install was unsuccessful in your situation does
not in any way (in my opinion) lessen it's usefulness in a variety of
situations.

Anyway, speaking of disk-cloning...

As you may be aware from my past posts on this subject we are strong
advocates of the disk-cloning process for comprehensive backups of one's
system. Simply stated, it's hard to imagine a better backup system for
most PC users than one that creates a precise copy of one's day-to-day
working HDD, including the OS, all programs & applications, and of course
all personal data. So that if & when the day comes when the user's
"source" HDD becomes defective or the OS becomes so corrupted that it is
unbootable & dysfunctional, it's a relatively easy matter to restore the
complete system through the use of the "destination" HDD, i.e., the
recipient of the cloned contents of the source HDD.

Our preferred program for this use is the Casper 5 program, and I have
previously indicated why we prefer this program in a number of posts. Many
users prefer the disk-imaging approach (creating individual files
containing the data contents) to establish & maintain a comprehensive
backup system.

In your own situation, had you a clone of your HDD at the time the
problem(s) you related surfaced, might that not have resolved your problem
at least in returning your system to a bootable, functional state? You had
stated at the outset of your posts that "My system had been working
perfectly" before the problem(s) arose.

I'm not familiar with the disk-cloning software you mention that was
included with your recently purchased USBEHD. Perhaps you'll find it
useful so it's certainly worth a try. As to your query questioning whether
the disk-cloning process will create a "huge file". Understand that since
we're talking about a clone of your system (not a disk-image), so as I
indicated above, the clone is a precise copy (for all practical purposes)
of your source HDD. It is not a "file". As such, the amount of disk-space
taken up by the clone will be virtually identical to the contents of your
source HDD. So, for example, if you're cloning a single-partitioned 120 GB
HDD that contains say, 70 GB of total data, the recipient HDD (your USBEHD
in this case) will similarly create a 120 GB partition holding those 70 GB
of data. Or you could create a partition of 80 GB on the external HDD if
you wished to hold the 70 GB of data. Or some disk-cloning programs
(Casper 5 is one) will also provide an option of setting the partition on
the destination drive just sufficient in size to hold the contents of the
source HDD, say 70 GB in this example.
Anna

Thank you very much for your time and explanation.
Casper 5 costs money which I don't have, so I'll muddle along with
the applications I have and try to make due.
Again, thank you.