I'm concerned a hardware component in my computer may be quitting on me. Beginning last night, I restarted my computer and the Windows XP "log off" sound was horribly distorted. Upon restarting, the computer hung for probably 3x to 4x the normal time at the Windows XP boot screen (black screen with Windows XP logo in the middle and scrolling blue bar underneath). Now every time I restart the computer always hangs for a long time at the same boot screen before going into Windows, and takes much longer than normal to load my system tray programs/icons.

I also tried to run a CHKDSK, and the process always freezes at: "CHKDSK is verifying file data (Stage 4 of 5)".

I'm using the computer right now, as it still boots up and is functional. It seems a little slow, though, and I want to figure out the problem before an important component dies and I lose all my data. All help is appreciated!

either you need to reinstall the OS or your hard drive is dieing.


I would reinstall the OS first or Get another Hard drive checker program to runs in DOS to scan the hard drive witch someone can post. I dont know any free ones right off the top of my head.

Hey big. Can you give me more details on your system. I'll try and help. How old is the computer. Have u made any mods yourself ? Is it a brand name or a shop/home build ? Can you give me a spec for the system, ie how much RAM, HD size/type, processor etc. One last thing. Are you running internet security software of any kind ? sounds like you may have virus or overload of spyware.. has the pc been getting slower over the last couple of months or has this happened all of a sudden ??

goto www.bootdisk,com, download a 6x dos disk image , boot it and run chkdsk.

Chances are it'* not a virus/spyware. AVG Free scans every night, I always run AdAware, I use Kerio Personal Firewall, and I often run HijackThis and browse through the registry. If it'* some kind of virus, it'* something crazy that none of these programs are catching. No, it hasn't been getting progressively slower. Yesterday morning it booted like greased lightning, just as it usually does. Then all of a sudden last night it just took 3x longer at the Windows boot screen. No idea why, but I'm leaning toward bandit'* theory of an HD failure. Damn, that sucks. This machine is a shop/home build that is about 5 years old (except for the power supply, which is about 1 year old).

Pull out one of your memory chips and reboot to see if it helps. Maybe a memory chip is ready to fail? Also, have you plugged anything in your USB ports that are still there? Ive had that problem before too.

First get all your critical stuff burned to a CD, or copy to another drive if you have one.

DOS 6.X is not going to support NTFS partitions...

Sounds to me like motherboard or memory if it is freezing. If the hard disk is bad, and assuming the chkdsk program is not corrupt, I would not think that a bad hard disk would cause the system to freeze.

EDIT: Noisy power supply could also cause voltage to fall out of spec and induce transients. This would also cause lockups.

Another thing to look at is the heatsink fan. is it running? if not, those chips get hot fast, especially on boot up since all of your system resources are starting at the same time.

Tony, modern processors have a built in failsafe temperature spec, if there is something wrong with the cooling system, the computer will automatically shut off. Unless you're overclocking and allowing it to get super hot really fast, temp usually is not an issue.

If anything, i'm leaning heavily towards HD failure. Usually bad boot sectors cause hangups and eventually it will just BSOD when you start it and then shut off.

I'm thinking the reason it stalls/locks up/freezes on Check Disk is when its hitting that bad sector and its having a problem repairing it or resorting the data.