chkdsk found problem

[Guest]

Hi all

Running Windows XP home on a Dell Inspiron 6000. No partitions or anything.

Laptop crashed one day without any prior warning - was working fine up till
then.

On restarting, it goes to a text prompt which says the "....../SYSTEM" file
is absent or corrupted. I understand this means either my registry is
corrupted or the hardware is broken?

So I used the Windows Setup CD to boot and run Recovery Console. Then typed
CHKDSK which told me that "the volume contains one or more unrecoverable
problems". So I tried to fix with CHKDSK c: /r , which told me the same
thing, and CHKDSK c: /f , which came up with "the parameter is not valid" as
if it didn't understand this command.

Is this likely to be a software or a hardware problem? If the former, any
sources for fixing it (I have searched the newsgroups already)? If it is a
hardware problem, how come this keeps happening?! It will be the third time
we will take it back to the shop, having had the motherboard replaced twice!

Thank you ever so much.

Tom

 

[DL]

It means that the hard disk has, or is failing.
Asertain the make of hard disk, visit that manu site and download/create
their checking utility