Hi everyone, I'm new here and I would greatly appreciate any help you guys can offer me.

I have a Dell 8400 Dimension Desktop and every time I boot it, a screen pops up and asks whether I want to start the computer normally, Safe Mode, last good configuration, etc. No matter what option I choose, a blue screen pops up later saying UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME.

I read other posts on this topic like http://www.daniweb.com/forums/thread41835.html and http://www.myfixes.com/articles/system. But I when I tried to perform a repair it tells me:

"Setup did not find any hard disk drives installed in your computer
Make sure any hard disk drives are powered on and properly connected to your computer, and that any disk-related hardware configuration
is correct. This may involve running a manufacturer-supplied diagnostic or setup program.
Setup cannot continue. To quit Setup, press f3"

I was able to bypass this problem from another forum - http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic18329.html but when I try to perform a repair it didn't ask which Windows installation I would like to log on to. Instead it had C:\> It didn't say C:\WINDOWS> which I was expecting. I typed "CD WINDOWS" but said "The path or file specified is not valid" and was still on C:\>

So I typed chkdsk /p and it says:
C:\>chkdsk /p
CHKDSK is checking the volume...
CHKDSK is performing additional checking or recovery...
CHKDSK is performing additional checking or recovery...
CHKDSK is performing additional checking or recovery...
19% completed.

It seems to be stuck on 19% for a while now so I don't know if I did anything wrong. Or is this normal? If it's normal, is it also okay to perform "fixboot" the same way? (i.e. C:\>fixboot)

Once again I would greatly appreciate any help you guys can give me.

Thanks,
Jason

chkdsk finished but stopped at 38%. It says:
The volume appears to contain one or more unrecoverable problems

Should I still continue with fixboot? I'm afraid to continue without guidance. Thanks.

Hello,

This is Richard from Dell Online Community Outreach. This link http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/format.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&deviceid=3841&libid=13&releaseid=R100688&vercnt=2&formatcnt=0&SystemID=DIM_PNT_P4_8400&servicetag=&os=WW1&osl=en&catid=-1&impid=-1, will provide you the Dell diagnostics, which you can use to test if the hard drive needs to be replaced or not.

Regards,
Richard B
Dell Online Community Outreach