I welcome assistance from all members on this form. Please assist me when i give unsound advice...Thanks
Hi Duchess
Without trying to hurt your feelings, may I ask why you haven't considered the "longterm" solution to your problem. In your original post you indicate that it has been going on for some time.
Unfortunately you have purchased applications from a reputable vendor which do not work well together. The vendor has now provided a solution that may, or may not work..ie "Here are some 'suggestions' as to how to solve the problem". Further, the suggestions are essentially simple, but not really remedial. They are as follows:
PERFORM A SURFACE TEST........The results of this fairly lengthy process are informative but in the end they "fix" nothing. A failed test here simply means your media will not reproduce upon a read what was written. You now have an additional problem commonly known as "my drive has bad sectors". A passed test indicates your device can write data and read it back as written anywhere on your drive. Notice that on this test, the only good comes from a failure, it gives you more information. A passed test gives you assurance.
RUN SPEED DISK....This really another way of saying "defragment the disk" and rearrange file s optimally for the fastest and most reliable access by the "read/write" mechanism. Also place the files on the drive in such a manner so that future fragmentation possibilities are minimized, and to free large contiguous areas for new writes. Norton says the NSD does this better than NDD. <<<<<<--I believe this "difference" triggers your "cuurent" error message. There is a distinct possibility that a permanent reconcilliation between NSD and NDD is not possible.
RUN IMAGE
Again the wording "try creating an Image of all your drives" promises no remedy. If you succeed, fine, your drive has been imaged. If test fails, you will receive an error. You are already there, you are receiving errors.
ADD A SMART SENSOR TO SYSTEM DOCTOR
You have indicated that this is not an option.
My (two cents worth)
Scandisk is produced by Symantec (Norton). It has the blessing of Microsoft. They ship it with the OS. NDD is an enhanced version of this product. Keep them.
SystemWorks' compatibilty is tenuous. Repackage the product, remove it from your system, and advertise it for sale on E-Bay.
It takes space on your drive, ties up memory and resources you could channel into better uses, slows down boot process, complicates troubleshooting, and is at the "root" of your problem.
If you cannot bring yourself to do this I would at the very least "demand" some of Symantec's support. I can offer you none.
Now, how to get to DOS and move to a directory where NDD.exe can be executed.
(I am assuming NDD.exe is in C:\Program Files\Norton Utilities)
Restart....After system hardware test, screen will go blank, immediately press and release F8 key repeatedly until "Microsoft Windows 95 Startup Menu" appears
You want to select "Command prompt only", choose number 6. Highlight it and tap[enter]
You now are at the C:\> prompt level
Type CD Progra~1[enter]
You are now in the C:\Program Files directory
Type CD Norton~1[enter]
You are now in the C:\Program Files\Norton Utilities directory
Type NDD.exe[enter]
This should bring up Norton Window from which you can make your selections....
Any problems please post back.
Smitty