DOS prompt in W2K? and Safe Mode?

  • Thread starter Thread starter ms
  • Start date Start date
M

ms

I want to run chkdsk, need to get to a DOS prompt. Book said go to command
prompt in Accessories, run from there.

I did, get message, processess are running, schedule chkdsk after next
restart.
I did, and windows booted up normally.

I tried F8, gives a choice of booting from floppy or hard drive, either way
gives normal bootup, not Safe Mode.

Several questions:

1. How to get to a real DOS prompt to run chkdsk w/o processes?

2. How to get into Safe Mode?

ms
 
ms said:
I want to run chkdsk, need to get to a DOS prompt. Book said go to
command prompt in Accessories, run from there.

I did, get message, processess are running, schedule chkdsk after next
restart.
I did, and windows booted up normally.

I tried F8, gives a choice of booting from floppy or hard drive,
either way gives normal bootup, not Safe Mode.

Several questions:

1. How to get to a real DOS prompt to run chkdsk w/o processes?

2. How to get into Safe Mode?

ms
Click to expand...

I just saved a bunch of Google search data, will edit it and see how it
works.

ms
 
ms said:
I want to run chkdsk, need to get to a DOS prompt. Book said go to
command prompt in Accessories, run from there.

I did, get message, processess are running, schedule chkdsk after next
restart.
I did, and windows booted up normally.

I tried F8, gives a choice of booting from floppy or hard drive,
either way gives normal bootup, not Safe Mode.

Several questions:

1. How to get to a real DOS prompt to run chkdsk w/o processes?

2. How to get into Safe Mode?

ms
Click to expand...

This is from a help file:
quote
To get into the Windows 2000/ XP Safe mode, as the computer is
booting press and hold your "F8 Key" which should bring up the "Windows
Advanced Options Menu" as shown below. Use your arrow keys to move to
"Safe Mode" and press your Enter key.
end quote

Using F8, I see a menu with only 3 choices: boot from:
floppy drive
hard drive
CD drive

None of these lead to the above "Windows Advanced Options Menu" to get to
Safe Mode.

How to get that "Windows Advanced Options Menu" screen?

ms
 
ms said:
I want to run chkdsk, need to get to a DOS prompt. Book said go to command
prompt in Accessories, run from there.
Click to expand...
I did, get message, processess are running, schedule chkdsk after next
restart.
I did, and windows booted up normally.

I tried F8, gives a choice of booting from floppy or hard drive, either way
gives normal bootup, not Safe Mode.
Click to expand...

*** It seems your BIOS uses F8 as its own boot device selection key.
*** This is bad. Try pressing F8 a little later to get the Windows
*** boot selector.
Several questions:

1. How to get to a real DOS prompt to run chkdsk w/o processes?
Click to expand...

*** DOS is an operating system, same as Linux or Windows.
*** If you want "real DOS" then you must boot the machine
*** with a DOS boot disk, which would be pointless in your
*** case. Click Start / Run / cmd {OK} to get to a Command
*** Prompt.
2. How to get into Safe Mode?
Click to expand...

*** See above.
 
*** It seems your BIOS uses F8 as its own boot device selection key.
*** This is bad. Try pressing F8 a little later to get the Windows
*** boot selector.


*** DOS is an operating system, same as Linux or Windows.
*** If you want "real DOS" then you must boot the machine
*** with a DOS boot disk, which would be pointless in your
*** case. Click Start / Run / cmd {OK} to get to a Command
*** Prompt.


*** See above.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the data.

I got into Safe Mode as you described. It turns out that F8 has to be
pressed at just the exact right moment after the initial BIOS screen to
get the selection screen. Very touchy, if I do it again, the answer is
keep trying, to get that exact timing.

In some respects, W98SE is easier, even if less stable.

One outstanding issue, you described how to get the Command Prompt, using
chkdsk I've been there, chkdsk has problems with running processes, just
like W98 scandisk.

How to solve that, when W2K has many necessary running processes?

ms

..
 
ms said:
Thanks for the data.

I got into Safe Mode as you described. It turns out that F8 has to be
pressed at just the exact right moment after the initial BIOS screen to
get the selection screen. Very touchy, if I do it again, the answer is
keep trying, to get that exact timing.

In some respects, W98SE is easier, even if less stable.

One outstanding issue, you described how to get the Command Prompt, using
chkdsk I've been there, chkdsk has problems with running processes, just
like W98 scandisk.

How to solve that, when W2K has many necessary running processes?

ms
Click to expand...

When chkdsk detects that it is unable to run due to some files
being open, it asks for your permission to run when you next
boot the machine.
 
When chkdsk detects that it is unable to run due to some files
being open, it asks for your permission to run when you next
boot the machine.
Click to expand...
Yes, I saw that message, I then rebooted, but windows booted up normally,
no evidence that chkdsk was running, certainly no report afterward.

What is supposed to happen? I assume it does not run invisibly.

Or, is a setting needed?

ms
 
When chkdsk detects that it is unable to run due to some files
being open, it asks for your permission to run when you next
boot the machine.
Click to expand...
Forgot to add- and what do I do with all those running processes?

ms
 
ms said:
Forgot to add- and what do I do with all those running processes?

ms
Click to expand...

When a chkdsk process gets scheduled to run at the next
reboot then you can see how it runs while it goes through the
boot process. You will find a record of its actions in the
Event Viewer under the Applications log.

When you wish to check your system drive (usually drive C:)
then you MUST reboot the machine for it to happen. When
you wish to check other drives then you may be able to close
the processes that lock the open files. I cannot tell you what
processes they are - it's your machine!
 
Pegasus \(MVP\) said:
When you wish to check your system drive (usually drive C:)
then you MUST reboot the machine for it to happen. When
you wish to check other drives then you may be able to close
the processes that lock the open files. I cannot tell you what
processes they are - it's your machine!
Click to expand...

This is true if you want to repair any problem that chkdsk may find.
However, if you just want to run the scan to find our whether a problem
exists (no /F, /R, or /X option), you can do that without rebooting. This
can be useful when rebooting is inconvenient and you want to know whether
there's anything to be gained before doing so.
 
When a chkdsk process gets scheduled to run at the next
reboot then you can see how it runs while it goes through the
boot process. You will find a record of its actions in the
Event Viewer under the Applications log.

When you wish to check your system drive (usually drive C:)
then you MUST reboot the machine for it to happen. When
you wish to check other drives then you may be able to close
the processes that lock the open files. I cannot tell you what
processes they are - it's your machine!
Click to expand...
Thanks again, I will try this in C and post back tomorrow. At this point,
checking my D programs and data folder will be a real hassle as there are
so many W2K processes I would have to investigate to see if they can be
disabled, my own programs are easy.

In W98SE, killing everything but explorer and systray meant I never had a
problem running scandisk. But it takes an expert to figure out all those
W2K processes.

BTW, I found today a small app that seems to run checkdisk even with
running programs:
-----
CheckDisk
Version 1.03
Dirk Paehl Germany
http://www.paehl.de/english.php

CheckDisk is a powerful tool for searching and repairing disk errors. It
is quite similar to the ScanDisk tool or chkdsk.exe, supplied with the
Windows operating systems (Windows 2000 and higher. Possible with Vista
and admin right). You can select either standard or full tests. The full
test additionally performs a sector check. It is capable of finding bad
sectors on your disk and marking them as such. The program works both
with hard disks (including SCSI and RAID) and removable media. Work on CD
too.

(Can work in W2K, even with running processes)

Typical Report:
Volume label is D drive.
CHKDSK is verifying files (stage 1 of 3)...
File verification completed.
CHKDSK is verifying indexes (stage 2 of 3)...
Index verification completed.
CHKDSK is verifying security descriptors (stage 3 of 3)...
Cleaning up 53 unused index entries from index $SII of file 9.
Cleaning up 53 unused index entries from index $SDH of file 9.
Cleaning up 53 unused security descriptors.
Security descriptor verification completed.
15358108 KB total disk space.
8532888 KB in 69271 files.
25076 KB in 4510 indexes.
0 KB in bad sectors.
218452 KB in use by the system.
65536 KB occupied by the log file.
6581692 KB available on disk.
4096 bytes in each allocation unit.
3839527 total allocation units on disk.
1645423 allocation units available on disk.
Check Disk: Finished OK
 
When a chkdsk process gets scheduled to run at the next
reboot then you can see how it runs while it goes through the
boot process. You will find a record of its actions in the
Event Viewer under the Applications log.

When you wish to check your system drive (usually drive C:)
then you MUST reboot the machine for it to happen. When
you wish to check other drives then you may be able to close
the processes that lock the open files. I cannot tell you what
processes they are - it's your machine!
Click to expand...
With the OS running, Run, cmd, chkdsk worked fine for C, assume chkdsk D:
will make it work for the D partition. I also rebooted, opened Safe Mode
with Command Prompt, same result.

Safe Mode has an issue, I will open a separate thread.

Thanks for the help

ms
 
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