# [SOLVED] Disk Read Error Occurred - What Do I Do?



## Vanchatron

I just tried turning my other PC on and got the message "A Disk Read Error Occurred, Press CTRL+ALT+DELETE To Restart".

When I press CTRL+ALT+DELETE it just restarts & I get the same message, although I am able to go into the BIOS etc before the message appears.

I am running Windows XP & have the following specs:

CPU - Intel Pentium D 920
Ram - 2gb DDR 2
Video Card - 256mb Nvidia Geforce 7600 GT
HDD - One 40gb IDE

I'd really appreciate some help with this. Reinstalling Windows isn't really an option either because I've lost my Windows CD, plus I hope I don't have to reinstall Windows because I have a lot of personal important stuff on that HDD that I don't want to lose.

Thanks.


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## Doby

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Is the drive recognized in bios?

If its seen in bios download the drive manufactures diagnostic tools to test the drive, these tools are loaded onto a bootable floppy or cd so no operating system is needed to run them.


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*



Doby said:


> Is the drive recognized in bios?
> 
> If its seen in bios download the drive manufactures diagnostic tools to test the drive, these tools are loaded onto a bootable floppy or cd so no operating system is needed to run them.


How do I check whether it's recognized in bios? It must be recognized mustn't it because it's been working fine for a few months now.

Also, how do I check who manufactures the HDD?

Thanks.


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## Doby

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Enter bios, also called setup, this is done by tapping a key (could be delete, F1,F2 depending on motherboard) at start up. Once in bios check under "standard cmos features or similar and see if its listed there.

The manufacture of the hardrive will be printed on a lable on top of the drive so you will have to open the case.

Post back with what motherboard you have or the name brand and model number of the computer and all so tell us the hardrive manufacture


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## Guest

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Hi Vanchatron :wave:

To check whether it is viewed in the BIOS you can tap F1, F2, F4, F6, F8, F11, F12, or the Delete key to get into the BIOS. Then look for your Boot Devices and see whether the HD is viewed or not. Then I would like you to tell me the manufacturer of your drive so I can give you the download link to the Manufacturers HD.


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

OK yes it's recognized and the manufacturer is seagate


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## Guest

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Test your Seagate by using the *Diagnostic Tool ISO*. Burn the ISO using some burning software like Nero but do *NOT* use the Windows burning utility. Set the BIOS to startup from the disk and run the diagnostic on the drive. If it comes back with an error then post it here and I will work with you to return the data.


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

OK thanks a lot that's great. I'll have to do it tomorrow though as I have no blank CD's at the moment & seeing as it's 3am I can't buy any right now. Please keep subscribed to this thread though as I'll reply back tomorrow as soon as I have got some blank CD's & run the Diagnostic.


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## Guest

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Do not worry, I subscribe to all of my threads :smile: and good night.


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Just one last thing before I go. If there is an error, is it possible to fix it so that I don't lose all the data on the drive? Night :wink:


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## Guest

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Well there is many things we can do to *try* and retrieve the data, but there usually isn't any way to really fix a dead HD. Really, I would have to be right there with you to fix the HD myself as you do not have the knowledge to do what I need. Like we would need a clean room and other things.


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

OK I ran the diagnostic and it says the following:

Model: ST340015A
Serial: 5LAAKARG
Revision: 3.01
Test Results: PASSED

*Test Info/Results*:

ST340015A/5LAAKARG

Started Short DST
DST Completed Without Error
Short DST Passed


So it looks like there is nothing wrong with the hard drive


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## Guest

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Im osrry but you had to run the Extended test, sorry I did not tell you before. Run the extended test, I am sure the drive is dead but we will check now.


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Done but the same result


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## Guest

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Okay so I can cross out dieing HD. Do not worry and have hope, as I love hardware and I have never let it beat me. Usually this forum would tell me to check the drive but I suspected it had no damage. The most common issue is that the MBR is corrupted or a sector has gone bad ^^. Lets start trying to repair both.

http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/topic/19004/. Since it is very late I will just give you that link and you can read through that forum post ^^. You will need your XP CD and a HD enclosure so you can back up your data. Buy a HD enclosure and connect your HD to another computer to take the data off. :smile: Hope this assists you and I will be back to tommorow to assist you better as I am to tired right now :smile:

Good Night,
TechPro5238

*EDIT:* Also try replacing the IDE cable and see if this fixes it to :grin:

*EDIT2:* Sorry, I keep Editing (lol) but the next thing we could try is resetting your P and N list which is a drastic format which really will kill everything in the drive including low level instructions for the drive to normally work :smile:


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## justpassingby

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

It's a good idea to backup your data on another computer but please don't format the drive. There are freewares out there that can repair a MBR or boot sector without harming your data. An XP install disk can also help. Also if this is some file system error then running chkdsk will fix it. The extended test from the manufacturer's diagnostic tool can detect bad clusters (which can happen accidentally, no need to worry as long as they don't start to appear regularly) but can't fix file system errors.

Since this is a regular 3.5'' drive you can simply hook it as a slave in another desktop computer to backup your data. See this guide at "installations instructions" steps 1 and 2. Set the jumper as slave and hook it on the middle connector of the IDE cable on the other computer (replace the CD-rom or secondary hard drive if needed). It should get detected automatically. See if you can access your data from that other computer.

From that other computer you can give these two free programs a try :
http://findandmount.com/
http://www.pcinspector.de/default.htm?Language=1 

If they say your partition/file system is fine then try running (start => run) chkdsk X: /F /R (where X is the volume letter corresponding to the non-working drive).

Another solution would be to use an XP install disk while keeping the drive in your own computer, but it's always better to backup your data so try the above first. You don't have to use your own XP CD, you can borrow a friend's as long as you don't use it to reinstall Windows on your drive. In the BIOS set the boot order to CD-rom first, save and exit. Press a key to boot from the XP CD when prompted to do so and press 'R' to start the recovery console when you have that option.

From the recovery console run 
Fixmbr
Fixboot
chkdsk /R
Wait until it finishes and report with the result. Try setting back the boot order to HDD first and see if it gets any better.


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## Deleted090308

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

I would try justpassingby's suggestion first - using an XP disc and run chkdsk /r.

Start the computer with the Windows CD.
At the *Welcome to Setup* screen, press *R* to select the repair option.
At the command prompt - type *chkdsk /r* > press <Enter>.
Type *Exit* > press <Enter>.

Take the XP disc out.

Reboot.

If that doesn't help:
Repeat the steps above, but type *fixmbr* instead > Enter, then *fixboot* > Enter.


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Thanks guys, I'll be going out in around an hour to pick up an XP disc from a friend then I'll try the CHKDSK etc options & post back with an update


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

OK I just found my XP Disc & booted from it. This is what happened & the messages I got:

1) Press Any Key To Boot From Cd

2) Setup Is Inspecting Your Computer's Hardware Configuration


I've left it for an hour now and it's just hanging at a black screen doing nothing. Any ideas?

Thanks.


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## justpassingby

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Try slaving the drive in another computer and see if it gets recognized correctly then run chkdsk from there. See post #16 for detailed instructions.


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*



justpassingby said:


> Try slaving the drive in another computer and see if it gets recognized correctly then run chkdsk from there. See post #16 for detailed instructions.


I can't because my motherboard in my main PC is quite a new model & only has One IDE slot which I'm currently using for my CD drive. The faulty HDD is IDE which means if I set it up as slave I'd need to use the IDE slot that my CD Drive is currently using. That's all well & good but then I can't put the XP disc in to run CHKDSK.


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## justpassingby

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

You don't need to use the XP CD to run chkdsk from another working computer as you can run it from within Windows. Set the jumper on your failing drive as slave then hook it in place of your CD drive. Start your computer normally and get into Windows. Tell us whether your failing drive gets detected correctly there : it should be available in my computer. See if you can browse the files on it.

Then go to start => run and type chkdsk D: /F /R (assuming your non-booting drive got the letter D). Answer no if it asks to unmount the volume then yes to schedule the scan at next restart and reboot the computer.


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

OK I set it as slave, but couldn't access the drive because it said something about it being corrupt. I then ran the "chkdsk D: /F /R" command from RUN which you asked me to do. It didn't ask me to unmount the volume & didn't ask me to schedule the scan at next restart, it just went ahead with it. Command Prompt then opened and a load of stuff started happening within Command Prompt itself then a messsage in CMD appeared saying something about being verified or completed.

It has now gone on to "Recovering orphaned files" and some other things. It's still running now but I checked the properties of the slave drive and it is reading as the following:










Does this mean it has completely deleted everything on the drive? 


As it's still running I'll get back to you when it's completed.


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

OK the scan completed & I can now access the drive as a slave. All I need to do now is to put it back into the other PC and see if it boots 

If it does then all I can say is WOW, you guys are amazing!


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

OK I put the HDD back into the original PC and booted it up but got the following message:


Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:

<Windows root>\System32\hal.dll

Please reinstall a copy of the above file.


Well how do I do that?

Thanks.


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## Deleted090308

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Try this first:

Start the computer with the Windows CD.
At the *Welcome to Setup* screen, press *R* to select the repair option.
At the command prompt - type *fixmbr* > press <Enter>.
Then - type *fixboot* > press <Enter>.
Type *Exit* > press <Enter>.

Take the XP disc out.

Reboot.


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## justpassingby

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Try eneles' solution. If it doesn't help then tell us if you still have the same error message. If you do then go back to the recovery console (same command prompt where you typed fixmbr and fixboot) and type *bootcfg /rebuild*. 

Fixmbr fixes the master boot record, fixboot fixes the boot sectors and bootcfg /rebuild will edit the boot.ini file in case it's corrupt. Better to start with fixmbr to make sure the following commands write at the right place, nothing should go wrong on a single drive system with only one partition and one operating system installed. See method 2 here : http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314477. Tell us if you get a new error message after you did this.


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## Vanchatron

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

Hey guys I can't thank you enough, it's working fine now ray:

Thanks a lot & I'll be sure to come back here for help in the future!


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## Guest

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

It seems your case has been finished. Please set this thread as solved. You can go to:


 *Thread Tools* (at the top of the thread)
 Choose "*Set this thread as SOLVED*"

Here is an example picture of a thread being set as solved:


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## Deleted090308

*Re: "A Disk Read Error Occurred" - What Do I Do?*

I'm glad you got it fixed. :smile:


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