Huge problem (NTFS)

[BillyF]

About 1 month after getting the computer, it would randomly freeze, forcing me to manually restart and greeting me with "Disk read error" messages. It would do this even 30 minutes into a fresh reformat (NTFS), and I've had many computer's before (on XP) and never this problem before.

The shop, replaced the Seagate with a Western Digital HD and upgraded the BIOS to help prevent video memory corruption (?) and said my problems should be over. But, now, 4 weeks later, my game (Natural Selection) freezes, forces me to restart manually, and presents "Disk read error" messages.

What can cause this ? I only have a few Steam installed games (CS, CS:S, DoD, DOD:S, Hl1, Hl2), Elder Scrolls Oblivion, Battlefield 2, a large selection of movies, and thats it. My drivers are updated (video card, sound, mobo) and i hadn't recently installed anything (within 24hours).

Is it a fault of the NTFS file system ? Should I reformat into FAT32 ??

[jholland1964]

Give us more info on the computer....how much RAM is installed?

[ShadowPuterDude]

What is the Service Pack Level of XP? Pre SP2 had a rash of this type of error message.

IDE cable and/or IDE controller could be bad.

Could have the wrong copy of HAL installed for your hardware. Only a full reinstall will fix this.

From the Recovery Console issue the following commands: chkdsk /r, fixboot, and fixmbr

In that order.

[Blue_Geek]

is ur HDD ATA or SATA , more info please ....

[cauzomb]

I agree with Shadow, the most common random read error is cabling. Usually read error's are data cables, bad memory, or bad motherboard capacitors for the power supply circuits.. Cables from the PSU have small round connectors inside that commonly stretch out in diameter then become loose, the slightest vibration harmonic will cause the connection to "float" between the pin on the hard drive plug long enough to make the drive get a data read error, or click on and off several times. The cool thing is the molex connector rounds can be smooshed back together with a small flat head screwdriver or the point of a voltage probe stuck between the plastic shell and the outside of the round connector. Another common read error is caused by Over/over clocking the FSB.