Just some recent history concerning my computer first:
1. I've been at home (parents house) most of the summer, away from *my* computer.
2. My computer is a Dell Dimension XPS that I got a little less than a year ago. Around November of last year I got a 2nd HD and installed it with little complication. It has worked fine until now. Also, I believe both are NTFS file systems.
3. This past weekend I went back to my apartment for a few days to check on things, etc. While I was there, I decided that I would switch in an old HD I had from my last computer with my 2nd HD in the Dell. I wanted to do this because I had some stuff on the old HD that I wanted to transfer over to the new computer and I had just never gotten around to it. Obviously, I couldn't take my C drive out because it has Windows and whatnot.
4. I got what I wanted off the old HD and not long before leaving yesterday, I reinstalled my secondary HD because I wanted to bring my computer home with me (it sucks being on my mom's slow-ass computer all the time).
5. With my dad and gf's help I loaded it up in the car and headed home on the 5 hour drive. We were all very careful with the eqiupment, didn't drop it, bang it, or otherwise know of anything that we could've done to harm it. It is possible that the secondary HD wasn't mounted properly in the case, because I did it fairly quickly, but from what I can tell, the problem is not the secondary HD because it was just a a data drive, I didn't have any applications/windows stuff on there. I don't think it would cause a boot problem.
6. After getting it home, I hooked it up, powered on, and after a few seconds at the WinXP loading screen it gave me this error message. Since then, I've scoured the internet for ways to combat this problem, but alas, nothing has yet to work.
OK, so what I have done:
1. Checked and re-checked my HD connections. I unplugged the IDE cables and plugged them back in. The mobo looks fine and doesn't seem to have shifted any during transit or whatever. I seriously doubt its damaged.
2. I tried booting the computer in as many different ways as I could think of....With only the C drive hooked up (no secondary drive), I went into the BIOS and changed boot sequences (BTW, all devices are detected in the BIOS, so I doubt its the IDE cables or anything, it at least recognizes that it is there), finally I decided to try a boot disk. Lacking a copy of the WinXP installation CD here (my mom got an HP, it didn't come with one, and mine is 5 hours away), I downloaded the program that allows you to make floppy-based WinXP boot disks.
3. I made the boot disks (it takes 6 in total) so that I could boot from them and access the recovery console. I got to the recovery console and typed "chkdsk /p" it asked for the loaction of autochk.exe, I typed the location (C:\WINDOWS\system32) and it said it couldn't find it. I went ahead and tried "fixboot." It DID recognize a faulty boot partition on the C drive, but it also said that it would rewrite and fix it. I let it go ahead with this, typed "exit" and let the computer reboot. Alas, I was once again greeted with the BSOD with the same error message "Unmountable Boot Volume."
So, I've tried a lot of stuff, but there are some pretty knowledgable people here and maybe you guys can help me out. I'm fretting having to completely scrap most of what I have - the mobo, my C drive, whatever - even if they don't SEEM to be the problem. My current guess, based on the fact that fixboot says there IS a problem on the C drive with the bootsector that some data somehow got corrupted (even if fixboot can't, well, actually fix it). Also, the fact that it can't find autochk.exe.
I'm wondering if I'll have to somehow procure a copy of XP, maybe even buy a whole new copy (ugh, its expensive, but not as expensive as having to replace my computer parts, etc.) and just do a whole reinstall. Would that work? And would I still be able to keep most of my data unrelated to Windows? Or is this a situation in which I would have to do a full reformat?
Or are there any other potential solutions you guys can think of? I can provide more information if its necessary, but I know there are some pretty bright people on here and any help would be appreciated.
1. I've been at home (parents house) most of the summer, away from *my* computer.
2. My computer is a Dell Dimension XPS that I got a little less than a year ago. Around November of last year I got a 2nd HD and installed it with little complication. It has worked fine until now. Also, I believe both are NTFS file systems.
3. This past weekend I went back to my apartment for a few days to check on things, etc. While I was there, I decided that I would switch in an old HD I had from my last computer with my 2nd HD in the Dell. I wanted to do this because I had some stuff on the old HD that I wanted to transfer over to the new computer and I had just never gotten around to it. Obviously, I couldn't take my C drive out because it has Windows and whatnot.
4. I got what I wanted off the old HD and not long before leaving yesterday, I reinstalled my secondary HD because I wanted to bring my computer home with me (it sucks being on my mom's slow-ass computer all the time).
5. With my dad and gf's help I loaded it up in the car and headed home on the 5 hour drive. We were all very careful with the eqiupment, didn't drop it, bang it, or otherwise know of anything that we could've done to harm it. It is possible that the secondary HD wasn't mounted properly in the case, because I did it fairly quickly, but from what I can tell, the problem is not the secondary HD because it was just a a data drive, I didn't have any applications/windows stuff on there. I don't think it would cause a boot problem.
6. After getting it home, I hooked it up, powered on, and after a few seconds at the WinXP loading screen it gave me this error message. Since then, I've scoured the internet for ways to combat this problem, but alas, nothing has yet to work.
OK, so what I have done:
1. Checked and re-checked my HD connections. I unplugged the IDE cables and plugged them back in. The mobo looks fine and doesn't seem to have shifted any during transit or whatever. I seriously doubt its damaged.
2. I tried booting the computer in as many different ways as I could think of....With only the C drive hooked up (no secondary drive), I went into the BIOS and changed boot sequences (BTW, all devices are detected in the BIOS, so I doubt its the IDE cables or anything, it at least recognizes that it is there), finally I decided to try a boot disk. Lacking a copy of the WinXP installation CD here (my mom got an HP, it didn't come with one, and mine is 5 hours away), I downloaded the program that allows you to make floppy-based WinXP boot disks.
3. I made the boot disks (it takes 6 in total) so that I could boot from them and access the recovery console. I got to the recovery console and typed "chkdsk /p" it asked for the loaction of autochk.exe, I typed the location (C:\WINDOWS\system32) and it said it couldn't find it. I went ahead and tried "fixboot." It DID recognize a faulty boot partition on the C drive, but it also said that it would rewrite and fix it. I let it go ahead with this, typed "exit" and let the computer reboot. Alas, I was once again greeted with the BSOD with the same error message "Unmountable Boot Volume."
So, I've tried a lot of stuff, but there are some pretty knowledgable people here and maybe you guys can help me out. I'm fretting having to completely scrap most of what I have - the mobo, my C drive, whatever - even if they don't SEEM to be the problem. My current guess, based on the fact that fixboot says there IS a problem on the C drive with the bootsector that some data somehow got corrupted (even if fixboot can't, well, actually fix it). Also, the fact that it can't find autochk.exe.
I'm wondering if I'll have to somehow procure a copy of XP, maybe even buy a whole new copy (ugh, its expensive, but not as expensive as having to replace my computer parts, etc.) and just do a whole reinstall. Would that work? And would I still be able to keep most of my data unrelated to Windows? Or is this a situation in which I would have to do a full reformat?
Or are there any other potential solutions you guys can think of? I can provide more information if its necessary, but I know there are some pretty bright people on here and any help would be appreciated.
