Serious problem with slate and USB keyboard during startup phase...

I am having a severe problem with my MotionComputing LE1700 tablet PC:

The internal hard disk has developed a bad block problem. I was able to (more or less) fix this on the file level using "chkdsk /f/r/b" which tried to recover the damaged files and marked the unreadable blocks as "bad" (according to chkdsk's output only a single, non-essential file was hit by the problem).

So far, so good and for the moment I can work with the system. However, trying to avoid future disaster, I already ordered a new disk and I am now trying to save (as much as possible of) the content of the built-in drive to an external USB drive in order to later copy it back to the new blank drive.

Since the drive to be copied is the C: or system drive, my backup SW (Acronis Disk Director) can not copy the drive while the system is running. So it enters itself as first program to be started after reboot and - after a reboot - starts to copy the drive's content over to the USB drive. But apparently it doesn't leave out the files/blocks marked as bad during the chkdsk and so, during that copy operation, it fails and at that point then asks "... Abort / Ignore / Ignore All ?".

Now, if I could select "Ignore" or "Ignore All" I guess I could save the rest of my disk's content, but the show stopper here is, that my tablet is a real slate (i.e. has no keyboard attached) and so I can only attach a USB keyboard to the device. That keyboard, however, is apparently not yet active or not yet recognized during this early phase of the boot process and so I can hit whatever I want on the keyboard, there is no reaction, i.e. I can not tell that darn program to continue and ignore that bad block and hence I can not save my harddisk's content.

Any idea, what one could do here? I have run out of ideas, what to do at this stage. And I *hate* the idea, of having to restart essentially with a factory restored machine...

Michael

Hi,

Michael Moser wrote:
> Since the drive to be copied is the C: or system drive, my backup SW (Acronis Disk Director) can not copy the drive while the system is running.

Strange, since Acronis TrueImage does allow to back up the live
system drive, perhaps a feature disabled in Disk Director(?)

> Any idea, what one could do here? I have run out of ideas, what to do at this stage. And I *hate* the idea, of having to restart essentially with a factory restored machine...

Install the drive into a laptop and boot from the Disk Director CD
to make the backup? Or use a desktop or laptop and one of those USB
enclosures you can find e.g. by googling for '1.8" ide to usb
enclosure'?

- Jan

Hallo Michael,
a really bad situation :-(
This is one if the scenarios where I love good old COMPAQ's construction
of the "hybrid" having a detachable keyboard which unfortunately has
been abonded up by HP :-( :-(

Michael Moser wrote:

[TI]
> But apparently it doesn't leave out the
> files/blocks marked as bad during the chkdsk and so, during that copy
> operation, it fails and at that point then asks "... Abort / Ignore /
> Ignore All ?".
>
> Now, if I could select "Ignore" or "Ignore All" I guess I could save
> the rest of my disk's content,

I'm not sure how TI (which I have been using for quite some time) will
handle the bad sectors - never had that so far. But for sure it would be
worth a try.

TI is really powerful. A while ago I was able to backup (no image) the
data from a seriously bad HDD of my son's computer.
Not even Bart's PE was able to see the bad drive attached to my desktop
machine. TI, however - run from it's emergency CD - was able see most
of the data and so I could save them.

> Any idea, what one could do here?

You'll have to it from some other computer.
In addition to Jan's valuable advice:
Instead of using a USB-enclosure for the notebook-drive you might just
buy an IDE-adapter for attaching the notebook drive to a desktop
computer (really cheap <!!>).

> And I *hate* the idea, of having to restart
> essentially with a factory restored machine...

I fully understand this.
But as you have TI, didn't you save the system to image-files from time
to time?
Doing this at least once the system and the programs are installed, IMO
is a true must.

Rainald

On Sun, 29 Mar 2009 20:46:09 +0200, "Michael Moser"
<michael-> wrote:

>I am having a severe problem with my MotionComputing LE1700 tablet PC:
>
>The internal hard disk has developed a bad block problem. I was able to (more or less) fix this on the file level using "chkdsk /f/r/b" which tried to recover the damaged files and marked the unreadable blocks as "bad" (according to chkdsk's output only a single, non-essential file was hit by the problem).
>
>So far, so good and for the moment I can work with the system. However, trying to avoid future disaster, I already ordered a new disk and I am now trying to save (as much as possible of) the content of the built-in drive to an external USB drive in order to later copy it back to the new blank drive.
>
>Since the drive to be copied is the C: or system drive, my backup SW (Acronis Disk Director) can not copy the drive while the system is running. So it enters itself as first program to be started after reboot and - after a reboot - starts to copy the drive's content over to the USB drive. But apparently it doesn't leave out the files/blocks marked as bad during the chkdsk and so, during that copy operation, it fails and at that point then asks "... Abort / Ignore / Ignore All ?".
>
>Now, if I could select "Ignore" or "Ignore All" I guess I could save the rest of my disk's content, but the show stopper here is, that my tablet is a real slate (i.e. has no keyboard attached) and so I can only attach a USB keyboard to the device. That keyboard, however, is apparently not yet active or not yet recognized during this early phase of the boot process and so I can hit whatever I want on the keyboard, there is no reaction, i.e. I can not tell that darn program to continue and ignore that bad block and hence I can not save my harddisk's content.
>
>Any idea, what one could do here? I have run out of ideas, what to do at this stage. And I *hate* the idea, of having to restart essentially with a factory restored machine...
>
>Michael
>

Have you checked in the BIOS of the slate for an option for USB
keyboards? A lot of times there's a legacy option for USB
keyboards...it might help in this case.

--
Cheers,
Steve Jain, Virtual Machine MVP
http://vpc.essjae.com/