ScanDisk for XP
Justin
Atlanta
I have used other windows OS' in the past and they all have a scan disk function. Where is it in XP? I have been using System Mechanic and when I do an optimized defrag, it tells me to use scan disk. HELP!!!:banghead:
0
Comments
hard disk compression = Not worth the hassle.
By the way, did you (ourlove) see my post in your thread "I want to build a computer" like a week ago?
What happens??? Early in the XP boot\startup process, XP looks in certain places in its registry for task notes for things that need to be done before Windows shows obvious signs of being up and alive. By telling widnows to run scandisk (essentially) with 2000 and XP,you are telling it to check a file system that needs to be fixed before the GUI CAN come up (your graphical thing that looks nice and lets you click instead of type) and load right. You can tell the same place that you use to call scandisk, in the dialog that pops up, not to do a surface type deep scan of media, and let it do a normal scan and it will normally obey this.
Formally, it is a CHKDSK run controlled by widnows with prescripted actions and if you then need to run a more solid scan you can manually with a direct CHKDSK call. If you want some ideas about CHKDSK's options,you CAN start up and go into teh recovery console from a CD boot, and then do this when you get the prompt:
CHKDSK /H
(which can also be typed as chkdsk /h as chkdsk is not very case sensitive)
Basicly, CHKDSK knows pretty well now what NOT to change and how to recognize real problems versus things that are NOT problems, so running it whan you do not need to will result in no errors popping up and a faster run than if it were fixing lots of problems. So, running it, so LONG AS YOU LET IT RUN ALL THE WAY THROUGH,should not hurt things and is more likely to help than hurt, even if you do it in recovery console. All that is wasted, if no errors, is machine time. WHAT IS MOST LIKELY TO hurt your XP install is to TURN BOX OFF OR INTERRUPT CHKDSK in mid run-- as far as using CHKDSK goes, that is. CHKDSK HAS to check many files that XP has to lock to run the GUI right while protecting itself, so it cannot run while XP is up, and this was so for 98 even to a large degree so the run of only before the GUI was loaded was adopted, asfar back as NT 3.51. Something called file system journalling requires this,and I will not go deep into how File System journalling works here and now, unless asked, but know a bunch about it and can devote a whole thread to it if wanted. But one of NT's supposed strengths is journalling.
John.
The name of the command used in DOS before DOS got its baby SCANDISK, was CHKDSK. And, if the earlier DOS scandisks failed, they told you to run CHKDSK. What did the work underneath all along??? CHKDSK.
CHKDSK has just been programmed to work with FAT, FAT32, AND NTFS in XP. YOU can still try to fix floppies with CHKDSK, and those are not FAT32, they are FAT (they can be FAT12 or FAT16 or FAT8, normally these days they are FAT16).
John.
Cool... I remember running CHKDSK in DOS 6.22 only to have it tell me to run ScanDisk instead.
Also, look at, while logged in as admin in Win2K, the startup folders in All Users and in the Admin (or your name for your user if you did not set up an admin account, which is a no-no) programs folders and see if in some cases you can move the things you do not want to start into a folder you make yourself called Disabled Startup Items followed by a reboot helps those things not to load.
In computer management in Win2K, you also have some control over what autostarts, you can disable starting at boot for apps that way for SOME apps that were written for Win2K. The submodule is called, in computer Management Console, Services and Applications.
So, there are ways and ways, different for Win2K, but Win2K always was a work in progress and lots of the things that were demanded were stuck back into XP Pro, and in parts back into Home after folks found the Computer Management Console and moving things by hand somwhat difficult, though the Computer Management Console is still there as the Management Console in XP.....
There is also a Microsoft deved but unsupported TweakUI for Win2K, adn some of the things are in the Win2K resource kit which also docs the ways to control what apps run at boot, and for whom (as far as UID) they load and are accessible. Hint, use the properties tab for a program also (right click program icon, not a shortcut on desktop, but the icon in the program folder and\or the one in the Start Menu subtree,which is not a normal shortcut), and the properties choice in the context menu that pops up when you right-click an application in Services and Applications. Part of this, in Win2K, was left to software devs, sometimes the icons had limited context menus attached, and shortcuts get you the shortcut def context menu, as in Win2K not all icons are shortcuts.
This is the cliff's notes summary, BTW.
John.