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WP Problems
Disk corruption problems

New MessageWP Problems (modified 0 times) mpjetta
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Ok people...listen to this and please let me know what you think
might be going on, it is really weird. I started the hacking process
by taking 1 of my 2 extra IBM 1.3gig laptop drives and throwing the
IEDOC image as well as the 98se CABS and WP drivers on it. I then
went through the whole process of installing the new iedoc image as
well as win98se with no major problems. I could boot into both the
DOC and harddrive with no problems for a day or 2. Then I shut my wp
down after being on overnight and when I went to turn it back on I
got a "Invaild System Disk..." when it tried to boot from the HD. So,
I removed the drive and tried to boot from the DOC and got a "I/O
Disk Error" and thought it was a little weird. So I put the laptop
HardDrive back in my laptop and booted of a win98 cd since my laptop
could not boot off the hardrive now either. Now in DOS, and doing a
directory listing all the old files seemed to be there but all had
messed up names, for example my "Mp3s" dir was now
called "APQS ! ! !" and the "Drivers" dir was now
named "DSIWESS! !". I just assumed the HD died somehow and started
from scratch again with ANOTHER laptop drive. I installed 95 on it in
my laptop and it booted up fine in my laptop just like the last one
did. So I copied over all the DOC image stuff, drivers, cabs etc.
again and put the HD back into my WP just like the 1st time. I then
attempted to boot off of it and got the same errors and it would not
boot off of it. So, now very frustrated, I took out the BIOS battery
and reset that completely for I thought maybe I messed up some
settings. After the BIOS was cleared back to factory defaults, I
enabled the IDE Bus and touched no other setting and still got the
error booting up. I then proceeded to put the HD back into my laptop
and it would not boot off of it again. When I booted off of a boot
disk, the c: drive was all messed up again. Nothing like a "Windows"
directory named "WHN88RE" :) The only thing I can think of which
makes very little sense to me is my lil Virgin is corrupting
everything attached to it now for some reason. The DOC as well as 2
harddrives have gotten messed up and unable to boot after being
attached and attempted to boot from. Maybe I fried something somehow
causing this, maybe....who knows...does anyone have any ideas? Please
help =)

Thanks.

03-19-2001 01:58:21

New MessageRE:WP Problems (modified 0 times) dogcacher
Profile
1.Bad ram

2.Overheating

3.Stactic electricity

4.Insufficient power

03-19-2001 07:52:56

New MessageRE:WP Problems (modified 0 times) Frogking
Profile
Have you run a virus scan?
Can you bum me a .sig?
03-19-2001 11:02:14

New MessageRE:WP Problems (modified 0 times) Dag2000
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I don't have any great advice to offer, but I had a similar experience. c:\windows became c:\whndovs and my other directories were similarly scrambled. fdisked the thing then reformatted and reinstalled. Don't know what caused it, but hasn't happened again. Just wanted to let you know you aren't alone or insane.

=Dag

03-19-2001 23:15:10

New MessageRE:WP Problems (modified 0 times) mpjetta
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I have not tried a virus scan yet nope.

Dag2000: Thanks for the response...Im glad Im not insane :)

What are you guys partitioning your drives to, Fat16 or Fat32? I am pretty sure I have tried both and they both got all messed up but I have tried so many things to no avail that its hard to remember.

-Nate

03-19-2001 23:33:40

New MessageRE:WP Problems (modified 0 times) melidosian
Profile
Hope there's some EEs out there to support this theory:

Here's the potential problem, when a data line goes bad it can not turn the current high to send a binary 1 so it's seen as a 0. If you notice the "windows" changing to "whndovs", you notice the "i" (1101001) changed to "h" (1101000)and the "w" (1110111) changed to "v" (1110110). Each of these changes represent the last being a 0 instead of correctly being a 0. Could be a bad circuit board trace or ribbon cable. You can image how quickly your drive can become corrupted when each byte it writes can be something other than intended.

03-28-2001 21:59:11

New MessageRE:WP Problems (modified 0 times) kray
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Nice thinking, but take the example of mpjetta where Mp3s (MP3S) turned into APQS there's no pattern in the change of the bits.
03-29-2001 02:20:31

New MessageRE:WP Problems (modified 0 times) gr8_brit
Profile
I have to agree with the "defective bit" theory...

Remember that a disk drive isn't just magically filled with data only, the FAT contains a huge number of pointers to where that data is stored, also the clusters are chained together as linked lists etc etc.

You only need one of these pointer values to be screwed up and "the whole house comes a tumblin' down".

Sounds like a bad cable, or a bad circuit trace.

Also remember these units weren't shipped with Disk Drives installed, so there's no guarantee that the IDE interface was ever actually electrically tested! ( a common save-a-few-cents move for mass manufacture)

Did you try another cable? (it's not mentioned in the first post)

Cheers,

gr8_brit
03-29-2001 10:23:33

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