Serious error messages or not??

[Guest]

Ahhhhh! I'm freaking out! Long story short: I'm having trouble with
'checkdisk' which keeps wanting to run every time I boot up my computer. (See
previous post: 'checkdisk' problems' for more background info.) Now I'm
getting error messages: "The file or directory C:document and
settings\administrator\local settings\temp\temporary internet
files\content.IE5 is corrupt and unreadable. Please run chkdsk utility" What
the %$!@ is going on? Is this serious??? I let checkdisk run again for over 3
hours this afternoon, hoping the problem would fix itself, but no luck. I
don't know what to do. Please help....

 

[Patrick Keenan]

Ahhhhh! I'm freaking out! Long story short: I'm having trouble with
'checkdisk' which keeps wanting to run every time I boot up my computer.
(See
previous post: 'checkdisk' problems' for more background info.) Now I'm
getting error messages: "The file or directory C:document and
settings\administrator\local settings\temp\temporary internet
files\content.IE5 is corrupt and unreadable. Please run chkdsk utility"
What
the %$!@ is going on? Is this serious??? I let checkdisk run again for
over 3
hours this afternoon, hoping the problem would fix itself, but no luck. I
don't know what to do. Please help....

First, that location is the Internet Explorer browser cache.

Second, this may indicate that you are using the Administrator account as an
ordinary user account, and this is not a good idea. That account should
be reserved for critical maintenance. If you *aren't* using the
Administrator account, this message is not a sign of good system health.

Third, if you're getting continual disk errors, and chkdsks isn't working,
it's an indication of failing hardware.

Drives are cheap now, 250 gig drives are under CDN$75. What's your time
worth? Your data?

Get another drive, export your mail settings, shut down, replace the old
drive with the new one. Remove the old drive and leave it out. Install
the new drive, install XP and update it, install your apps and A/V
utilities. THEN reconnect the old drive and copy your data back.

During the data copy, your files will be scanned for malware.

This process will likely take less time, and be more reliable, than trying
to fix or work around failing hardware.

Once you're done and you're absolutely sure that you have all the data off
that drive, you can consider wiping it and using disk check utilities, but
again, it may not be worth it.

HTH
-pk