need a pc guru

[dracken1]

i'm on the laptop atm, my main pc has a prob.
it won't start. it gives me a msg saying that my "system32/drivers/fastfat.sys" file is either missing or corrupt.
i have changed bios settings to boot from the xp pro cd, it says press any key to boot from cd but when i do i just get the fastfat missing blurb.
if i f8 it will only allow me to boot in normal mode it won't allow me to high light safe mode.

prior to this i was getting 2 beeps from the system which turned out to be a
improperly seated graphics card.
i'm 99.9% sure its not a virus or intrusion problem. as i use panda platinium and my system is basically invisible, only time i ever get an intrusion attempt alert is when i'm on this forum.
so any ideas or do i have a nice bill hovering just over the horizon :(

[Yoda]

first thing to check is your RAM as bad memory can cause the OS to generate the corrupt FastFAT.sys error message
check it is installed okay and securely seated and then if you have more than one dimm then try one at a time to rule out memory problems

do you SP2 installed?

have you tried booting from cd (as in reinstalling) and clicking r for repair?

Yoda

[Rogue Monkey]

I hate to say this mate but it sounds like yer hard drive has Pegged it! Fat 32 is the drive system format for windows. Ive had two go on me! Its rare these days but some times they just start registering random errors and crashes till eventually they just wont work at all. I hope its not cos you will lose everything on ye drive! :eek: I`ve had the same thing and it was my hard drive both times! Basterd gremlins! :( The ray of light is that hard drives aint that dear now. Hope there is a simpler answer but it does sound like the same problems I had!

[dracken1]

i don't have sp2 installed.
as i said i have changed bios settings to boot from cd but it won't i just get the fastfat msg.
and below that it says that i could boot from cd and press "r"
very odd when the system says on the prior page that is ready to boot from the xp cd
very odd

[dracken1]

first thing to check is your RAM as bad memory can cause the OS to generate the corrupt FastFAT.sys error message

it also i belive applies to vga memory my graphics card has 128mb's and as i stated it had come dislodged

[Yoda]

it does sound like hardware failure
due to the fact you cannot boot up in safe mode

i am assuming you are still getting a piccy on the screen so the graphics card is working,'if the graphics card is dodgy the screen may start flickering as it heats up' this i think does rule out the video-ram

as for the hard drive, it is still reading but stopping at a point- so my feeling is it is unlickly

the processer ios booting it up (to an extent) and i gives an OS error so that rules that out

that really leaves the Ram and the MOBO

as i said before Ram is the most likely see if you can swap a stick from elsewhere,

then that leaves the Mobo (no real way of testing other than replacing all components with different ones)

BUT
before stripping the mobo down try formating the drive from floppy first, and try to re-install windows as this would then rule out OS and/or HDD error

hth
Yoda

[dracken1]

thanks for the info yoda
i have 2 strips of 256k. i'll try swapping them as i belive it uses strip one for initial boot up.
otherwise i'll take it up to pulsar comps a local company and as long as they can save my harddrive i'll upgrade it as we should be broadband enabled in 3 days.

[Topper]

If you want to check the memory you can use Memtest86 (free).

http://www.memtest86.com/