Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!texbell!letni!mic!cms2!tomf From: tomf@cms2.UUCP (Tom Fortner) Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc Subject: Re: Non-DOS drive error? Message-ID: <262@cms2.UUCP> Date: 12 Jun 90 14:42:33 GMT References: <3111@crash.cts.com# <3177@bnr-rsc.UUCP> Reply-To: tomf@cms2.UUCP (Tom Fortner) Organization: Christian Medical & Dental Society Lines: 37 In article <3177@bnr-rsc.UUCP# mlord@bnr-rsc.UUCP (Mark Lord) writes: #>>> I ran chkdsk, which responded with "Probable non-DOS disk. Continue?". #>> Are you sure that NDD actually corrected the FAT? I had the same problem with #>> the "Probable non-DOS disk. Continue?" message and NDD corrected it. #> #>This seems to be a popular problem. What has happened is something has #>altered your FAT improperly. The media descriptor byte, which should be F8 #>hex for hard disks, has been changed to something else. Grab a FAT editor, #>such as the one in Norton Utilities, and change the FIRST byte of the FAT to #>hex F8. That should do it. # #Perhaps a little TOO popular ? Same thing occured on my system the other night. #Neither FLU-SHOT+ nor SCANV63 found anything suspicious though.. I just applied #this same fix and all is normal.. if it recurr's I'm going hunting, though.. In the process of reading and writing to the disk the cylinder and sector definitions become less and less defines. Also, system lock-ups resulting in cold boots damage files and cause FAT problems. Some programs (like Ventura Desktop Publisher) require total control over all areas of real and extended memory and when they are denied, they lock-up the system and damage files. If you use such a RAM hog program, do not use memory allocation statememts such as shell=c:\command.com /e:128, or TSR's that may cause memory errors. Tom -- Tom Fortner ** The greatest gift a man can offer Christian Medical & Dental Society ** his Maker is a repentant committed UUCP: cms2!tomf ** life and a disciplined, diligent INTERNET: tomf@cms2.lonestar.org ** mind.