Using 74,52 unallocated GB to fix XP file system.

[Vigaenson]

In a thread I began 5 days ago here, I explained that while I was trying to recover from an unclean shutdown of my WXP SP3 that was on a 74,53 GB partition C: of my WD 160 GB HDD, my desktop suffered electrical troubles that made it unusable.

I have been told that when I overcome the electrical troubles the first thing I must do is to "boot Windows and fix the file system". I have also been recommended to use certain tools that can start from a CD or a USB device.

But because until the file system that's on partition C is not fixed I won't have an OS that will allow me to download these tools to CD or USB devices I have thought of something that I would like to consult here because I don't know if it is feasible:

• Can I use the same Microsoft's Windows XP Home Edition CD I used to install the OS on C to access to the 74,52 GB that are not assigned in my WD 160 GB HDD, create a partition there and proceed to a clean and complete install of Windows XP SP3 there (in this new partition)?
• Once this new partition and clean install are there, can I use them to boot into Windows from them?
• Once I have booted from them,  can I  download the necessary tools to the CD and/or USB devices and from there solve the file system problems that are on the first partition?

Can you please answer these questions for me?

PS: Before asking these questions I have searched here and in other places but haven't found answers that apply.

[truenorth]

What was the nature of this:"my desktop suffered electrical troubles that made it unusable." truenorth

[Vigaenson]

Thank you for your interest egghead.
I can only tell you what I was told by the technician to whom I took the cabinet with motherboard, processor, power supply, fans, diskette & DVD drive.
Is that enough or do you need more details?

[rthompson80819]

A lot more details.  Was it a power surge, was it lightning, did the power supply short out, etc.?

[Vigaenson]

There was no electrical surge, lightning nor power supply short out.
The only thing that perhaps I can add to what I said here is the transcript of the notes I made while I was following the instructions of the blue screen and afterwards of the Microsoft Window Error Report
Do you think that can help? In that case I'll try to find them.

[BC_Programmer]

Sounds like somebody is trying to string you along. Computers don't exhibit those types of symptoms from an "electrical failure". It can be caused by a faulty power supply but that is a relatively easy fix and is PSU failure, not "electrical failure" which sounds more general.

You also, in that thread, don't cover what exactly "unusable" entails, or what happens when you try to boot to windows. This was the primary reason I didn't bother responding in that thread, actually- the description of the problem was very vague and you seemed more focussed on what IMO is a non-solution to that problem.

Also performing a chkdsk /r doesn't require a fully working Windows System. If you have the windows disc you can boot into the recovery console and run chkdsk /r on the drive from there, and with any luck you should be able to boot the system after running it.

To answer your question, yes, you should be able to create another partition from within windows setup and install windows to it. But since your goal is pretty much to run a disk check on the drive, you may as use the recovery console.

[Vigaenson]

Thank you for  your reply BC_Programmer, and  specially for  the last paragraph

I purposely tried to avoid using "electrical failure" in my previous posts and used "electrical troubles" because there was no electrical surge, lightning nor power supply short (at least not at the wall outlet level).

This is how things occurred:

After  trying unsuccessfully to follow the  Blue Screen indications the computer began to boot into Windows and I was able to access my account but a Microsoft Windows Error Report appeared. While I was trying to follow its suggestions, XP's updates  download progress bar  froze on the monitor . The same happened  with the mouse cursor and there was no response to the keyboard input.
Each time I rebooted the computer, the same thing happened.
At a certain point  I also heard a sort of muffled snap sound so I opened the cabinet, looked inside and smelled but everything seemed right.
Because the monitor was still frozen I rebooted the computer.
This time I wasn't able to boot into Windows  so I decided to access the HDD through a Linux Live CD I have.
So I started the computer with the Live CD on the CD-DVD drive.
The screen showed the Linux files were being copied  to RAM but at a certain point it stopped and the cursor  remained  flashing indefinitely on the screen.
I tried to reboot the computer but there was no response.
I tried to shut it down and there was no response so I unplugged it from the wall outlet.
After 15 minutes I plugged it back and restarted the computer. It was there where I discovered the fans worked,  but the blue light on the "on" button of  the cabinet didn't work and there was no screen response.
It was here where I decided to consult the technician.