The Old Joel on Software Forum: Part 4 (of 5) - better chkdsk for Windows XP?

better chkdsk for Windows XP?

I have been having terrible disk problems as of late. "Chkdsk /f" isn't fixing it. In the old days, Norton Disk Doctor and other tools were better at fixing sector problems. They all seem to have disappeared with the advent of Windows XP.

Anyone know of a better tool for disk repairing beside chkdsk?

Dave Navaro
Sunday, February 29, 2004

CHKDSK has never repaired bad sectors, and still doesn't. SCANDISK does this, and has been around for god only knows how long (at least a decade). Here's how to use SCANDISK in XP:

Right click on My Computer, click Open.

Right click on the hard drive in question, click Properties.

Change to the Tools tab. In the Error Checking box, click "Check Now".

Make sure "Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors" is checked (this will scan the surface of the disk for bad sectors, and yes, it takes a LONG time). You may also wish to check "Automatically fix file system errors", which is the equivalent of running "chkdsk /f".

Brad Wilson (dotnetguy.techieswithcats.com)
Sunday, February 29, 2004

SCANDISK was a DOS and Windows 9x tool. The Windows NT equivalent has always been CHKDSK. CHKDSK /R will locate bad sectors and recover readable information.

John Topley (www.johntopley.com)
Sunday, February 29, 2004

Huh. Learn something new every day. :)

Brad Wilson (dotnetguy.techieswithcats.com)
Sunday, February 29, 2004

I guess the confusion comes because chkdsk was the original disk checker from the very begining of DOS. Scandisk which was better than chkdsk and came out in DOS 6.2 and was used in Win9x and Win ME. In Windows NT, 2000 and XP the disk checker is also called CHKDSK but is probably not related to the original DOS chkdsk. Clear as mud??

DJ
Sunday, February 29, 2004

Then there's AUTOCHK... ;-)

John Topley (www.johntopley.com)
Sunday, February 29, 2004

Also, if you are getting bad sectors, that generally means that it's time to replace the drive.

Hard drives have a store of spare sectors throughout. If a sector starts to develop problems, it will generally detect it early and remap a different sector, transparently. If you are getting bad sectors on a modern drive, that generally means that it's about to keel over and die.

Flamebait Sr.
Monday, March 1, 2004