HIDGAF84

I don't think any of the statements I've made here, imply that I feel I "have it all figured out". Quite the opposite. I did not even know what SFC /scannow was… but the primary link discussed in this thread, explaining how to utilize a Windows 7 disk, says, "using another computer". If the very first error that I started this thread with, was still present, that would be obvious. I did not have access to windows. So I'm trying to find out if now with having access to windows through a normal boot, that that is not applicable. That is, before I go out and spend money on disks, and potentially waste time and effort. I'm also out of town, and it's frustrating to know that I have a massive stack of DVDs sitting on the counter at home. My sister is also closer than home, but I have also not been able to find out if you can make a Windows 7 disc with a Mac? She only has a tablet, but the brother-in-law has a Mac laptop. That would be my first possible solution if I cannot use my own computer. The link above, with the provided images, is stating the Main Tool. Does it not make sense, to do everything possible to figure out how, to utilize the main tool, before throwing in the towel? I agree… Computers are very stressful And aside from some web design and web graphic design, I have learned more about computers in the last however many days than I've ever known.

Well then… I guess I'll just be giving it a go; getting a blank dvd and seeing if I can make a disk from and use it on the same computer. I can't find an answer anywhere online, and no one seems to wish to comment on that issue, and instead just saying get a new hard drive. Which is not an easy undertaking given my circumstances, and is nonsensical before you utilize the MAIN tool that every webpage and people in this forum said to do, to attempt to address this problem. Utilize the tool I don't have; a Windows 7 disk. Again, I do not see how a problem I have had many times over the past (Firefox going non-responsive), but then [accidentally] hard booting in sleep mode, would equate to hard drive failure. If power outages and "just because" can cause the problems I've had, how could this not cause the very same problems. Since the problems with flash and Windows update months ago, self initiating check disks on boot, that I did not know would be running, I have had no problems. No data issues, no indications of hard drive issues, and now this. Getting a new hard drive before a Windows 7 disc usage is putting the the cart before the horse. I don't see how that makes any sense. Regardless of all of the complications I would have with getting a new hard drive. Without using a Windows 7 disc, even as a novice with in these matters, it seems completely illogical to me to not get a Windows 7 disc first. Shrug. And then there is system restore, and the dell back ups as well. My time sensitive April matters, are past. There's no reason not to utilize the tools that I still have; once I have the tool.

Assuming you have a link to a legal, downloadable copy of Windows, your local public librarian will more than likely be happy to download it for you. 2 day shipping from Dell; windows 10.

That analogy doesn't work… I used Adam Sandler's pause button. I went and did other things. I still have not utilized a Windows 7 disk. That's a pretty important tool that I am unable to utilize.

I don't have the money for either of those things… but furthermore I don't have a Windows disk for the new hard drive. I'd like to look up at my canopy and figure out why it's spinning before I cut it away, knowing that I'm going to lose my canopy; or at least my free bag. And you can knock about seven days off those numbers...

You need one of those "screwdriver things" to change your hard drive out, correct? Yeah, I don't have one of those either, at the moment... And how is it that I'm going to install windows on a new hard drive, when I don't have a Windows disk? I'm feeling a quote from Braveheart coming on, "don't change the subject..."

I don't disagree… but that wouldn't make sense before utilizing a Windows 7 disk. (And... I still have more evidence to point to simple file corruption, from flash and windows update. If those problems never happened, and all of a sudden this happened, I would be more inclined to agree.) And if my hard drive is going out… I'm buying a new system. I'm not getting a new hard drive. At least initially. I don't have time for all that, I just need a computer that's working. And windows 10 might be nice.

My DVD drive Does work… it successfully read the Dell "drivers and utilities" disk. It does appear though that auto play, "plug-and-play" association does not function properly. I should easily be able to copy anything off the disc directly; but a quick look through it reinforces that it will not be helpful for this circumstance, as others alluded to above. Can't even easily determine what everything is. Chrome is working just fine… Pretty sure I could download the image. Was just hoping to have clarification on that, before I bought disks. Can't really find a good answer, or a logical reason that burning a file to a disk and then booting with it wouldn't be possible... given what is working and what is not.

Not possible with the same computer?

Found my order emails (8/2012), searched the order number and I found my version: - Windows 7 Home Premium SP1, 64-Bit, English

Update... (partial) Phew!: After a little over 72 hours of CHKDSK being stuck at the same point noted above (after the "progress tease"), I had no other option but to hard boot; or of course Billy's option. After letting it sit for almost 2 hours (unplugged as well), I tried to do a Safe Boot immediately. It got hung up on classpnp.sys. Did a whole bunch of research and reading on that alone, ran start up repair, it apparently found something, said to restart to see if it fixed whatever it found. Restarted but returned to the repair menu, ran start up repair, ran SFC, ran start up repair again. nothing with start up repair, but SFC provided the same message it has continually; corruption but could not fix some of them. Tried again with SafeBoot, same issue. Been quite busy, and not able to spend anymore time. At 906p... Finally had the time to get back to it. The normal "not shut down properly" tasks ran, I returned to the repair menu. Ran start up repair and SFC, nothing with start up repair, same message with SFC. I then booted using "last known working configuration", and I made it back to the desktop. Everything stated above, as to the state of windows, prior to starting check disk, remains. Chrome, picture viewer, all data looks secure. All same things stop working immediately, bur all data looks secure... but not able to confirm video files aside from thumbnails. Q: - I am not able to bring up my system properties. I get COM surrogate has stopped working when I try to. How can I confirm what version of Windows I have? Again, I am pretty darn sure it's home 64-bit. "VER" in the command prompt did not give a "home" version, or type of bit. - as long as my DVD player is working, I can make a Windows 7 disc using the same computer, correct? - if I cannot make a disk with this computer… Is it possible to make a Windows 7 disc on a mac? My brother-in-law has a Mac laptop I could utilize. Otherwise I have no resources easily accessible.

By the way, I am aware of control + C and control + V usage within windows… Example of bizarre instruction: http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-update/cancel-chkdsk-in-progress-from-command-prompt/5b2e3c27-b3bb-43f9-bdc8-50452352d795?auth=1

Well… I am now at 48 hours on the same file. That 2K jump sure was quite the tease… I've seen direction to use "control + C", control alt delete, and a final usage of a hard boot. Anyone familiar with control+C...? Never heard of that command until researching aborting check disk.

Extra Notes: - The HDD light, IS still blinking showing activity; unchanged, as it has been. I have heard no adverse sounds of a noticeably failing hard drive, however I would not say that I do hear it "spinning", because it is quite silent, and has always been silent, and you can hear the fan for the laptop overall far louder than any hard drives noises. I do also have a SSD drive, but it is not bootable, only used for quicker booting; part of the system, not a personally added option. Didn't seem relevant earlier, but may as well make that known in addition. - received a PM stating that I have a 32-bit system, not 64: as seen from the file name of the initial error "windows\system32". My mistake likely linked to Windows updates; multiple times thinking it was providing me the wrong updates, and checking back-and-forth between the proper bits between windows and Microsoft office. Thank you for that!

Coo, thanks. And like with my Mac comment, opinions are all over the place on hard booting in stage four. And I would hate to cause more problems than I already have, without the chance of fixing what is already a problem. And without having even been able to try a system file check with a recovery disk. I can definitely let this run for another seven days. But at that point, I will most definitely have to shut it off. The time sensitive April computer work I needed to do, I don't even know for sure if it's still possible or not. If it's not, it's not the end of the world. It sucks, but not the end of the world. And not worth buying a new system till I had an answer on this one.

I did... but just reread it also. Similar error code on boot up, whether safe mode or regular; but different cause/initiator. Thankfully sfc /scannow got me out of that issue and back to the desktop, but I still had system file corruption issues; where only the things listed above would function. The one thing I do remember about that link, was the AVG comment. McAfee was on this computer originally, which I uninstalled and put Norton on. But up till recently have not had any problems with Norton; over three years of usage. Currently... I am stuck in CHDSK still. So I can't even try the drivers and utilities disk, can't make a USB windows 7 "disk", or even try a system restore. It jumped up 2,250 files, as said before within about 10 to 15 minutes, then got through an additional 74 faster than the previous time periods, and now I've been stuck on 157,091 for 28 hours. The one thing I CAN say, is I sure have learned a lot about computers, more than I ever knew before. I knew a little bit of web design and graphic design, but not really any coding or operating system stuff. If this is a hard drive issue, I'll be buying a new system, and then I'll probably use this computer as a learning tool to do further tinkering. Just play with everything I can find and go wild with it. But until CHKDSK finishes, I sure can't make a decision.

I was actually considering getting a Mac, before I purchased this set up… the cost is a pretty significant difference; but within the last year, I've had a few Mac friends say they were never buying another Mac. So like reading comments on Amazon, who knows what the hell to think…

1 extra tidbit on top of everything I said previously… In stage two, indexes: I had one unindexed file scanned. Though there are two listings, under directory file 89597. The first is webapps.json and next webapp~1.json. Though there are two listings with the same numbers, just with a different file, it says recovering 1 orphan file, but then zero on the next line... 0 unindexed files recovered. JSON, I knew was Firefox (from backing up my bookmarks multiple times), but I just specifically searched it, and confirmed that those are Firefox files. So, again, not discounting any opinions, but that does tie into Firefox becoming unresponsive, tying into what started this mess. Just a note… And Firefox did update a few different times since that last windows update that caused a boot up check disk. And of 1636 large file records processed, there were zero bad file records.

That sux...

Well… after continuing to read as much as I could find, and changing search criteria slightly, after my last post I found a comment by someone else with a similar problem, though his stage 4 had been on the same exact file for over 24 hours. Mine has not been That bad. He decided to let it sit, and it finally started again, but he never updated if CHKDSK finished. Lots of comments stated that it could be just reading errors that were continuing, and it would eventually get past it. I decided to do the same, went to sleep with it at 154,767, and woke up with 154,793 (small change but faster than it has been). Then about an hour later it shot up into the upper 800s, fast, and then shot up 2000; within about 10 min. Went up a handful more, and it has now been on 157,017 for at least an hour. So… I don't know, thinking this could be similar, maybe the bad sectors it's going through (even though they were very small - as listed previously), and it will eventually finish. After a quick jump of 2K, I can't justify hard booting it at this point.

Another comment about stage four or stage five being OK to hard boot: https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/office/en-US/c00f5049-3d2f-4a7c-8ecf-1a353aca7c52/how-to-stop-chkdsk-on-startup-after-it-starts-running?forum=winserverfiles

Ugh... I saw someone who posted in a forum with a similar issue as I'm having currently; over a day run time. Trying to find that currently. Just found this, but all the comments vary widely. "If it is running in the pre-startup and you are past Stage 3, meaning it is on 4 of 5 or 5 of 5. then you can just re-start your machine. I have done it on stage 5 of 5, which is the stage of checking the free space, and it started up just fine. If you re-start your machine during stages 1 to 3, you run the risk of loosing data." 12/5/13 -- comment https://community.spiceworks.com/topic/142733-can-you-cancel-chkdsk-while-it-is-running This was scheduled to run at boot up... And is stage four of five. Again, not disagreeing, just finding this bizarre, that the previous check disk issues, inconsistencies between the two discs, was directly after a flash crash, the second one as well, and the third was after a Windows update. All of them took less than 20 minutes to run. And I do not remember it checking ALL of my files. I didn't change anything at all, and for well over a month everything has been fine. Firefox has updated a few times, and Firefox is what was not responding before this primary issue started. And I'm wondering if the hard boot after "accidentally" putting it in sleep mode, is what caused the system file issues. I'm not in denial that my hard drive could be crashing, but it just doesn't make sense… If this hard drive is dying, I'm just going to get a new laptop, windows 10, and I'll make sure to create a Windows disk for the first time in my life... IMMEDIATELY. At the least I wanted to try a system restore, but this crap right now is crazy.

Thoughts on hard booting out of a check disk? This is absolutely insane… in almost 2 days it has not even gone 100 files. The first ~145K went slow but steady, now one file can take up to five hours. I'm at 154,763 of 250k. I'm assuming this is lots of HD video from iPhone and Sony HD cameras. Which none of it had integrity issues after the first check disk runs on its own. Everything is backed up… but I wouldn't want to damage my disk if it's not already damaged; in anyway. I had no idea this could take that long. This was already horrible timing, this is destroying any ability to even try to fix this.

Appreciate it! ... Yes, a USB drive was definitely a thought. But I don't have a clear one at the moment; was debating just buying a new one. However... I may have just found what I needed. I just got a hold of all of my software, all the unopened disks. I do not have a Windows 7 disc, but I do have a Dell "drivers and utilities" disk for an "inspron 17R." Quick Google search, it says you can reinstall Windows 7 from the disc… But I have not yet been able to see anything in relation to sfc /scannow or a "repair install" as on the link discussed above… on any on any Dell pages yet. Only a reinstall or system restore. Is this my "Windows 7 disc"? I would pop it in and give it a go, but I'm currently stuck in a check disk. Decided to run SFC again and check disk and see if I got any difference after a while. Check disk took two seconds before and said volume clear that first time. Now it's fully running.... 5 hours so far. Woops.

Last windows update was 3/28; because of the inconsistencies in the disk and the check disk issue, the new updates currently available I had not installed. That happened very shortly after the windows update. Since that time, only Firefox, Norton, Spybot, and spywarebot have been updated. No other HDD issues, everything has remained constant, no data integrity issues that I can tell. I think flash (after check disk from flash, all installable versions were removed. Now only chrome is used for flash content) and these windows updates, caused the issues, and is not a failing hard drive. I have no evidence to point to a failing hard drive. Those are all standard/regular updates, with the Windows update being the only thing "significant." Through further reading... it sure seems like a system restore, could, address corrupt system files; along with I can't make sense from the system file check log what is Actually corrupt. I am not at all discounting your statements. But I think any programs related things with those, if they were pushed back would not be too big of a deal; with in my limited knowledge base. Below the command prompt in the recovery options menu, there is a Dell automatic backup program (never cared about till now), I can investigate that further. Other than the windows update restore point, and whatever dell software may have done, I have made no manual restore points. Can't research it at the moment… But I am confused about "SP1", or any other differentiations with Windows 7. On the page enabling you to download an ISO image, the only differences are home, professional, ultimate, and 34/64. I don't see anything with SP1 or other service packs. I'm about 99.9% sure I have home 64. If I were hypothetically find my windows 7 disc that came with purchase, do any windows updates change the ability to use that disk? Service service packs wise?