File delete/rename problems after crash

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Guest

Hi all, My system crashed and restarted while I was trying to get my webcam
working agin (had just selected a new driver and pc restarted without closing
down - power spike type effect), and now I have problems with my filesystem.

There are a number of files I can neither rename or delete, and while I
might be able to log in using safe mode to remove an individual file (I
haven't tried that yet), so far I can't even tell which files are affected,
and which aren't.

I've also noticed that having accessed a file - I can't then delete it. Eg,
unzip a pdf, run adobe, close adobe - can't delete the pdf!

Any suggestions for utilities I can use to fix the problem, Windows or
otherwise?

Cheers,

Brian
 
Hi Rick,

Thanks for the reply - I was about to name my next-born after you if it
worked, but I've already got a daughter that I can call 'nutcase'.. :)

The message that appears when checkdisk runs is that it cannot lock the
drive for direct access, and immediately afterwards, it tells me that it has
completed checking files. The first time I ran it there was no change with a
particular file I know to be a problem.

I then wondered if my new 200g SATA drive might be causing some sort of
conflict, and so I ran the command again, powered off, switched the jumper on
my Asus A7N8X-deluxe motherboard to disable SATA, then powered on.

Same message appeared duing checkdisk (unable to lock for direct access),
however once windows appeared, a couple of programs now run that didn't
before, and I can amend a file that was causing me problems.

So it appears my problem is probably more to do with the configuration of my
system and the SATA drive - perhaps some sort of RAID issue?

I'm running 2 80g Seagate IDE's on my primary IDE, and 2 opticals on the
secondary. One drive is config'd for NTFS, and the second still has Fat32. I
partioned and formatted the SATA drive for 3 64g NTFS primary partitions.

I'm running XP Home, SP1... I've got SP2, but want to wait until I perform a
new install of WinXP. My plan was to install it on the new SATA drive, then
take the IDE's out once I've got everything working the way I want. (I
assume my WIN XP licence allows me to do that since the rest of my system is
as I bought it)

I'm about to check the Asus site to see if any of the bios updates mention
SATA drives, but if there is any other advice you can give, it'd be welcome..
(You might still get some naming rights! lol)

Cheers,

Brian
 
Ok, here is where I'm at now..

I've updated the Bios on my A7N8X Deluxe mobo to the latest version (1008),
and have re-enabled the SATA drive. As a result, my 'problem' file is now
locked again.

It definitely appears to be a conflct with the SATA drive. I'm off to
search the knowledgebase.

Every reboot, checkdisk is trying to scan my C: drive, and keeps getting the
'unable to lock drive error'. How do I turn that off now since it isn't
doing anything constructive?

Cheers,

Brian
 
Hi Brian,

Run "chkntfs /d" from a command prompt to turn off the dirty bit that sets
chkdsk to run.

I haven't seen any issues like yours on a SATA drive set, did the disk
checker ever run successfully?

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
 
Hi Rick,

Thanks for the reply, and will use the command to turn off the checkdisk
check.

I'm not really sure how successful the check was... Every time it ran it
said it couldn't lock the drive for direct access, and then reported it had
completed the file check immediaely afterwards. There was a series of about
a dozen or so full stops that would appear in batches over the space of about
3-5 seconds after that, before the computer would continue loading..

Funny thing is there are still plenty of files I can rename & delete - but
for whatever reason, a file that has been, or is in use, is off limits. eg,
I'm running MIRC, and every half an hour I get 7 new temp files created as
MIRC isn't able to update some ini files. My NOD32 updates can't be
processed either.

Anyway, most of my problems seem to disappear when the SATA drive is
disabled, so that's what I'll do for now.

Cheers,

Brian
 
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