corrupted hard drive

[Fred_Flint]

Hi all,
A friend has just got a pc and I helped him put it together. At first it runs very well but after transferring files across the network the pc start giving errors and when its rebooted the hard drive is corrupted so windows will not boot.

I have tried booting to the windows disk and fixing it but it cannot find the window install?

The pc spec:

AMD 2500(Barton)
XFX KT600-ALX (I told him not to, but…)
512MB DDR333 (generic)
200GB Matrox SATA
Geforce256 32MB DDR

Win2K Pro SP4. + All latest drivers. (not sure about BIOS)

This problem is very frustrating as the pc can work with no problems for days, then it corrupts the drive and I have to re-install everything again!!

Any help fixing this would be Appreciated.

FredFlint.

[MUYA]

It has been known that certain VIA BIOS versions and even Hyperions will corrupt file etc when copying large files. I dunno which to be exact but make sure u reserach which BIOS versions and Hyperions are those.

Make sure you check the www.viaarena.com forums. They are nice bunch who will help you out.

[digitalwanderer]

Also double-check and make sure his memory is good, bad memory can cause HD corruption too.

[Fred_Flint]

Thanks for replying,
I am going to go and look at that link, then update the BIOS. If that fail it must be the RAM. I think I have a stick of PC2100 about not sure if it will work with the barton, but ill give it a try.

Thanks
FredFlint.

[ALobpreis]

Rather than changing the memory, I suggest you to check the actual one. Download Memtest (www.memtest86.com) to make the boot disk and do the checking.
It's better to make the entire test, but if you can't, at least leave it running for half an hour or so. If you get no errors, it's quite sure the RAM is ok.
If the test gives errors, it may be not the RAM but some BIOS settings. Use default values better. :)

[Jon]

I've had numerous via motherboards... I've never had the data corruption problem and I copy lots of 4gb+ files across the network. I recently bought a KT400 based board and got the same kind of hard disc corruption. This turned out to be from using cheap rounded cables. Using a shielded rounded cable helped a bit, but was only solved by going back to using flat ribbon cables. Don't know if this will help you, but cheap and worth a try.