Windows 8 Memory Management & Repairing Disk Errors issue

Jennifer

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Hi, last night my laptop became very slow to load when I took it off sleep.

It took so long to load that I waited and eventually pressed the power button down for five seconds to turn it off just as the login screen finally loaded. When I turned my laptop back on, it kept loading (with the hp symbol above) with the message "Repairing disk errors. This might take over an hour to complete.". I left it on all night (since 8:30 PM) & it was still at the same screen by 11:30 AM the next morning.

I turned the laptop off again and on again about ten minutes later. I received a blue error screen that stated something to do with "MEMORY_MANAGEMENT" and then it went back to "Repairing disk errors". About an hour later this time, I have a screen with a "Automatic Repair" title followed by "Windows couldn't load correctly", "System Restore can try to restore your PC to an earlier point in time when it worked correctly, This repair will not change personal data, but it might remove some apps that were installed recently. You cannot undo this process.".

I definitely don't want to click Restore as I don't recall there ever being frequent backups of any kind and I'm not sure what will happen if I press Cancel. I'm simply leaving it to this screen until I can get help. I'm certain my data is still there as I said earlier that it did reach the logon screen once (though I was already in the process of turning it back off by that point) - something I really wish never happened (bad luck).

I've been reading that it is possible to "clone" or copy hard drive contents over using a USB or some type of recovery when booting the laptop? Can someone please help me find a way to copy the contents of the HD over to another device. I'd rather do that first instead of re-installing Windows 8. I'm a newbie and am not sure how to do this at all.

Also, what would happen if I press Cancel (not that I will)?

This hp laptop came with Windows 8 already installed. I believe it is a HP Pavilion 2000 Notebook with a 500 GB HD. The laptop is about 6 months old.

Thank you for any help.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8
    Computer type
    Laptop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Toshiba
I would say your symptoms sound like a good fit for a failing HDD. So the good news is that if the unit is only 6 months old, unless it was a refurb with a 90-day warranty, HP's on the hook to send you a replacement drive. Bad news is, if the HDD is failing then your hopes of backing anything up are likely slim to none. Even if we were just talking about a run of the mill corrupted OS, what good would cloning it do? You'd just have a corrupted OS on portable media as well.

I'd grab a copy of a Linux distribution that can be installed to a USB flash drive or portable HDD and boot that. From there, as long as you didn't encrypt the internal HDD, you can try and copy off files. Programs are a lost cause, don't even bother, but things like an MP3 collection or photos you have at least a fighting chance of saving.

Then remember the old sysadmin mantra: You only lose what you don't back up.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    8.1
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