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Ghost 2003 - XP SP-1- Disc Read Error (Read 4363 times)

Kookamamie

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Ghost 2003 - XP SP-1- Disc Read Error
Dec 2^nd, 2009 at 1:12pm

I've been doing a lot of reading here, but first time post. I had a 40GB drive that I cloned to a 120GB drive some time ago. I think the mistake I made was, I cloned the drive with Ghost 2003 on the drive, not from a bootable CD. So, I ended up with the cloned drive being called the F: drive. That cloned 120GB drive worked fine (after I changed all of the desktop icons to execute from the F:). A while back, I had someone properly clone the 120GB drive to a larger 320GB drive using Easeus Disk Copy 2.3. The new 320GB worked fine for for a while and then one day I turned it on and got a "read disc error". I tried rebooting with no luck. We thought it was a bad drive, so we cloned the 120GB to a new 500GB. The new 320GB worked fine for over a month and then when I turned it on the other day I got a "read disc error" again. I know... start over and reinstall XP. But I have so many program addons and plugins that would be a nightmare. Anyone have an idea as to what might be happening and how I might proceed?

Thanks

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NightOwl

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Re: Ghost 2003 - XP SP-1- Disc Read Error
Reply #1 - Dec 3^rd, 2009 at 1:27am

Kookamamie

Quote:

So, I ended up with the cloned drive being called the F: drive.

Yeah, that's not a good outcome!!!

Quote:

That cloned 120GB drive worked fine (after I changed all of the desktop icons to execute from the F:).

I'm surprised you were successful at booting! Usually, when the registry files point to the *C:\* drive to find the boot files, but the cloned HDD has a remembered drive of *F:\*, that usually results in a boot failure. Apparently not in your case! I would have re-done the cloning to resolve that problem without having to change all those wrong path statements for the desktop icons!

Quote:

The new 320GB worked fine for over a month and then when I turned it on the other day I got a "read disc error" again. I know... start over and reinstall XP.

Actually, I'd be looking at something other than the OS! I had a similar problem--I would get a random freezing or re-boot of the system. It was some short in the motherboard circuitry. And, had a friend whose system lost its ability to boot. The techs at the computer shop said it was a *failed* HDD. When it happened again 6 months later, I did some digging around--it was a loose RAM chip on the motherboard!

Quote:

Anyone have an idea as to what might be happening and how I might proceed?

So, I'd be looking at hardware. If some random electrical event happens at just the wrong time, it could corrupt files on the HDD, or......whatever....!

Make sure all connector cables (communication and power) to all devices and motherboard are re-seated, check the RAM chips.

Run the Mem386 RAM memory test to check the memory.

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Kookamamie

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Re: Ghost 2003 - XP SP-1- Disc Read Error
Reply #2 - Dec 3^rd, 2009 at 12:31pm

First, thanks for your informative response!

I understand your "not a good outcome" comment. But, what's done is done. What seems weird is that things work great for a while, then the "read error". Happening one time, you'd think drive failure, but when it happens twice and on different drives you start looking at something else. Could be hardware/connectors. I'll check. FYI, the BIOS is current. I doubt a virus because the machine in question only is rarely placed online for driver updates.

Question: Is there a 137GB barrier with XP SP-1a? Seems like I read , no.

Thanks again!

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Kookamamie

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Re: Ghost 2003 - XP SP-1- Disc Read Error
Reply #3 - Dec 3^rd, 2009 at 12:52pm

PS: A few times, at random, I've had the BIOS screen freeze. I hit the reboot button and everything was fine... so, maybe RAM chips. But then why won't the drive boot? Maybe something gets scrambled at shutdown. A computer guy looked at the first drive when it failed and he said there were missing Windows files and it wasn't recoverable.

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NightOwl

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Re: Ghost 2003 - XP SP-1- Disc Read Error
Reply #4 - Dec 4^th, 2009 at 12:58am

Kookamamie

Quote:

Question: Is there a 137GB barrier with XP SP-1a? Seems like I read , no.

Probably not an OS limitation. It's more a BIOS limitation--if you have a unit that dates back to the early 2000's--I think by 2002 or 2003 most BIOSs were capable beyond the 137 GB barrier.

Quote:

A computer guy looked at the first drive when it failed and he said there were missing Windows files and it wasn't recoverable.

Well, if you keep regular Ghost (or other imaging programs) backups, there's no such thing as *non-recoverable* because of missing files! Within minutes you can be back up and running!

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Kookamamie

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	Re: Ghost 2003 - XP SP-1- Disc Read Error Reply #5 - Dec 4^th, 2009 at 4:59pm I have the system working for now by making the first cloned drive the master and the "disc read error" drive the slave. I can still read valuable files off of it. During Christmas break, I'm going to rebuild. Again, thanks for your time and response.
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