So you’re using your Dell laptop (in this case a Dell Inspiron 1501 running Windows XP Professional) with no problems, turn it on one day and you get that gorgeous blue screen of death telling you that you’ve an unmountable boot volume. You call Dell support and they take you through diagnostic tests, get you to boot in safe mode (which won’t work by the way) and then they tell you to launch the recovery console or reinstall Windows.
Reinstall? No sirree!
Getting around this problem today (see previous post) here’s what I did (not my laptop as the MacBook Pro doesn’t throw up those kind of errors)…
- With the laptop on the blue screen, grab your Windows XP CD (might be branded as a Dell Reinstallation CD), pop it into the CD drive and reboot the laptop.
- When prompted, press any key to boot from CD, allowing a minute or so for drivers to load in the background.
- From the first menu you see, press ‘R’ to launch the recovery console. This will launch a dos-prompt driven recovery console allowing some basic disk commands.
- Enter your first command: “chkdsk /r” (give about 20-30 minutes to run).
- When completed, follow up with “chkdsk /p” (give about 2 minutes to run).
- Finally, follow up with “fixboot c:”. This will quickly test the boot sector and prompt you to write a new one. It is likely that the boot sector on your drive has become corrupt, once you agree to write a new bootsector, allow a half minute or so for the task to run until prompted with a success message.
- Type ‘EXIT’ to quit the recovery console and restart the laptop.
That… should be that. It helps to have the original Dell XP disc though. A standalone version wouldn’t display the recovery console menu on launch but the Dell OEM version does (purple coloured CD including Service Pack 1a – it’s been a while). Of course, if the disc doesn’t boot when you restart the computer it may be possible that you’re BIOS is looking to the hard drive before the CD. In that case you’ll need to enter the Dell BIOS (pressing F2 for setup on immediate restart). See here (Dell support) for specific details.
About Ken McGuire
Hello All.
I have a Dell D630 with the dreaded Unmountable Boot Volume Error. In following the steps detailed above to correct the Boot Volume Error, my computer powers off @ random. I will get %50 through the first check, if I’m Lucky, then the Computer shuts down. There is plenty of power. Now it seems to just shut off @ any given point. Does this sound like something that is repairable?
Before this came about I was having “split screen” and other video related errors. I sent the laptop off to be repaired, and upon its return I got the blue screen. The video was fine for a while, but in the process of “repairing” my computer I am having more split screen errors.
I was rather pleased with my first dell, but considering all the issues this one is having….
I may have to give up on the D630, and possibly Dell altogether. Many Thanx
For anyone with this problem, if you successfully regain access to your windows install following this method (i did, it worked great) FIRST PRIORITY IS TO BACK UP YOUR DATA IMMEDIATELY. there is always the possibility of heavier hard drive issues lurking in the near future. (for me it was only 9 days later, and then Kaboom!) no more hard drive. Whatsoever. Zilch. Warranty replacement, and no chance to get the data off (the hard drive was so internally screwed that it could not even be seen anymore by windows, bios, or via external connections) BACK UP YOUR DATA!!! and Good Luck!
You are a god. Thanks for posting such perfect instructions.
I’ve been trying to use the reinstall CD (purple) but it says I don’t have a hard drive. I have a SATA disk msg: Block 9617272 Uncorrectable data error. Is my hard drive toast?
I would just like to say a big thankyou, we have had no end of trouble with dell but our inspiron is now working again.
well done on a post that works
darren
I’ll be uncharacteristically brief:
Your instructions following “Reinstall? No sirree!” were perfect.
You have helped immeasurably, and we are very grateful.
Thank you, Thank you.
Respectfully,
Adam Williams
Fountain Valley, CA
Hi! Just wanted to say thanks a ton for this, it worked like a charm. I was dreading calling Dell since I’ve had awful luck with their customer service in the past so this was a life saver! <3
Actually after 2 days of using the library computer (ugh) I found this site! Everything above is great however, I too get the same error message, but for some reason, it is not loading up the disc upon restart. I have changed the options allowing the cd-rom to be first accessed, but I think my CD-rom is fried (I have had issues with it before the crash). Isn’t there a way to download somehing to a USB and use that?
@Atlandy
There are sites that provide the recover console on its own as a downloadable, though I don’t have it here myself. It comes as an ISO file (CD image) that you would need to open on the desktop, applications like WinRAR come in handy for that.
Once you’ve the recovery console, you could look at creating a bootable USB disk (using a USB key) but that’s a whole other tutorial, one I don’t have experience of myself for the Windows XP issues.
Thanks for the help. I actually got reinstall disk to work using the 2nd disk drive (slave drive), disabling the main cdrom and telling it to boot from the slave drive. I ran all the above chkdsk and fixboot stuff, and got back to windows! However, my computer runs as slow as a C64 now. It takes about 20 minutes to even boot up. Any sugguestions?
Thank you so much for putting this fix up! My computer was suffering from two issues (although I didn’t know it to begin with). First I had a iastor.sys error (arg!) which I managed to fix with help from people on a free tech support website (yay!) and then I had this as a new error popping up (bwfah?!). The people at the tech support website didn’t know how to fix the new problem, so I was all concerned that I was going to loose the data I hadn’t backed up yet (I had most of my important data backed up, but I had some stuff I had done in the last day or two that I hadn’t backed up, plus some not-important-but-I-still-would-like-to-retrieve it stuff I hadn’t backed up). This page is wonderful!
thank you sooooooooo much. wish i could buy you a beer and shake your hand, i was skeptical, but it worked and I lost no info, thanks again
Ken
Thanks bigtime! Worked like a charm!
Thanks again!
OMG Your instructions are spot on!! I thought we would have to buy our teenage son a “new” computer…Thanks a million..
And for folks that do NOT have the Windows XP CD nor the Recovery CD (we had neither)..You can purchase MY recovery cd that I made on Ebay soon…
This was so simple…
Again, thanks a million..
hey ken, i’m using a friends notebook, a Dell Inspiron mini 10, with no CD-Rom, I seen where you told someone that they would need an external CD drive but I was wondering if that is the only option, is it possible to hook a usb cable from the notebook to my home computer to fix it, i’m getting the unmountable boot volume screen by the way.
I have the same error message but I have a dell dimension 4600 desktop. When I put the install disk in, I can’t find a way to boot from it. I can get to the F2 menu but that’s it. Is there any way anyone can tell me what I’m doing wrong??
hi ken.
would you happen to be able to help me on this one? its been almost 2 years since i’ve been able to use my HP pavilion desktop….my wife mainly used it for emails and surfing the web but somehow either she or one of my kids downloaded something that will not allow us to connect to the internet…..
it kept going to the dealio.srch page and says that we have connectivity but it will not allow either the IE or Firefox/Mozilla browser access the internet. Have tried cleaning as much off of it by downloading cleaners onto a flash drive then installing it but when it says to update the software from the internet it goes nowhere….i have too much info on the hard drive we do not want to lose…the computer runs great other than it will not connect to the internet ……
Superantivirusware, AVG, and others have not worked …..paid some IT guy from our local pennysaver $75 and he couldn’t figure it out….I’m dumbfounded
please help or give me some insight
thank you.
Unmountable – boot – volume What a crock! Called dell 6 times and got some female Haji evertime who must of had the micophone in her shoe. I could not hear them and kept calling back for more of the same. Finally called Dell in Austin went thru their menu and when I finally got a human I said Tech Support . I got someone from this hemispear at least who was one a computer screnn reading to me what to do. I finally cound not get to R to take for the recovery but I kept trying and trying after mutipule restarts it finally took. Typed in the chkdsk/r and it did not work then typed chkdsk /r with a space between the k and the forward slant and away it went. Were at 63% completed right now . Looks like all will be well.
Thanks man you rock!
J.D.
Hi Ken, need your help. We have a Dell Dimension 8400. We got the Blue Screen. I was able to find the Symptom Tree and running the tests right now. I ran the tests for System Locks Up, Windows Blue Screen, Hard Drive Error. I get the same read test error codes: 0F00:0244 Msg Block 21577128 Uncorrectable Data Error; Error Code 0F00:1A44 for VerifyTest.
Is this fixable? HELP PLEASE. THANK YOU.
your brill followed you instructions to the letter and my unbootable amount is now bootable again thanks lap top working great thanks
Terry
My dell lap top is saying NTLDR is missing do you know how to fix this??
Thanks for any help ,
Eileen
you can try this one:
http://www.registryfix123.com
Thank you so much, this really helped me. I thought there was no hope & my pc was doomed. You really explained things really well, especially when referring back to a dell website for instructions on how to get the cdrom working. Because the dell website shows the different screens that could appear on our pc’s & then we just follow instructions from there. Thankyou times a trillion.
God bless you.
BIG THANKS KEN
, These things always have a bad habit of happening the day before I have any leave booked, good job I found your fix.
Thanks Again …… Aaron
Hey Ken!
I finally got my cd to work and I just typed in the “chkdsk /r” command & after running for a few minutes it stopped at 50% complete and says “The volume appears to contain one or more unrecoverable problems.” Then it asks for another command, what should I do??
Ken Thank you very much for all the man hours of re-installation and reformatting and updates avoided. Using your fixes plus finally letting windows update & letting checkdisk do it’s thing have breathed new life into my system. The internet is a magical thing & I’m just glad I came across your thread.
@Trex131-PHI You’re most welcome.
Ken!
I didn’t have faith that it would work. Because nothing has.
And low and behold. Here I am. Using my lappy once again!
Thank you thank you thank you.
Hi Ken,
How are you? Hope you are well.
My husband has an Dell 8600 Inspiron Laptop-about 6 years old. We have the blue screen with the Unmountable boot volume error or whatever. The blue screen just stays there when I put in the CD. How do you get the computer to restart so you can put the cd in to work, etc and then move forward with the repair that I see on your blog?
Dell could not help-said we needed a new hardrive but I think maybe not after seeing you repair technique.
Please advise………….Melanie
Hi Ken,
When I get to the part where it asks me which Windows installation I would like to log into, the only choice is E:\WINDOWS. I tried the chkdsk commands and then the fixboot . It didn’t work. Is my C:\ called E:\? If so, why does it take me to the windows folder. Thanks!
Hello Ken,
Just wanted to let you know that I gave your instructions for the blue screen of death fix to my husband and it worked! Yahoo! It is funny that you can be on the phone with Dell and they cannot fix it but you can. Also, all the tech businesses I called said he probably needed a new computer and I had a feeling he did not. Thanks again for your help. You really saved us a lot of aggregation.
Melanie
Hi Ken,
One more thing, Dave said he had to push F12 in the first step as soon it boots up which was not in your instructions at the top. Just thought I would let you know in case anyone else has the issue…………Melanie
i love you. you saved my computer from being thrown at the wall or out of the window. cheers
im having the same problem as Scott can type anything when i get to the Which Windows installation would u like to log into….it only lets me type on letter???? HELP PLEASE
Awesome fix. very scary but your write up hit the mark. thx
After swearing to never use pc again I do find myself in moments where I do need windows, so on my Mac I’ve got win 7. Worked like a charm, until… Somehow my boot volume got un mounted, I’ve dealt with the pc boot problem more than once and solved it the same way you did. Now win is still working but my Mac won’t boot into OSX. Would it be possible that the pc partition on my drive messed up my Mac partition in the same way as above problem? If you know, any help would be appreciated.
Best regards
Grim Bernhoft
help – I’m at recover console screen
says 1: c:windows
won’t let me type anything
locked up can’t get in or out
what do I do now
You are a computer GOD! I thought for sure I met the blue screen of death. got kinda worried it took over an hour but well worth the wait..Time to back it up. Thank you so much. I wish you success in all that you do! I wish i could some how return the favor! Peace
Have a Dell E1505 originally installed with Dell Vista OS and the dreaded Dell Media Direct. Hard drive crashes after a year and is replaced with a new one. Reinstalled Vista OS (from Dell with drivers and DMD). 6-7 months later, computer is caught in Dell Media Direct Loop. Can’t get back to Windows. Take it to repair shop and they were able to fix it. 6 months later it starts again, so I reinstalled everything again after breaking in through a well placed F2 while it was booting to DMD that took me back to Windows. Reinstalled everything and was fine for 2-3 months until it got back to the same DMD loop again. I was able to break out of it once to get all the files copied to the external HD before I couldn’t break back into Windows at all. Decided to take it back to repair shop with a stand-alone copy of Windows 7.
Repair shop wiped the hard drive completely, did a clean install of Windows 7. Battery had gone dead on him, so he plugged it in and laptop immediately fired up and tried to go back to Dell Media Direct. As it turns out, the power button circuit board was faulty (someone had spilled something on it at one time because of a bit of corrosion). I’m getting a new board, but the disturbing thing is why did the laptop try to boot Dell Media Direct when there is nothing on the hard drive (the repair shop has several sophisticated programs to clean partitions off of hard drives) and nothing about the OS that points to Dell Media Direct?
Does Dell code something in a hardware ROM someplace? I couldn’t find anything in the BIOS.
I have a hp mini 1000 no disk drive can i do anything about unmountable boot volume? Thank you sooo much!
A laptop saver! You are the man. Thanks!
WHAT IF ALSO MY cd PLAYER STOPPED WORKING?
Wow!!! Worked perfectly! My computer crashed at 11 am today. After finding your blog, it is up and running an hour later. Thank you. You literally saved my data and spared me from standing in line at best buy or spending $350 to get Dell Tech support’s “expert” assistance (basically wipe data and reinstall OS). Thanks again!
Thank you….thank you….thank you
After a few tries I was finally able to fix my Dell Dimension 8400 desktop
i have this problem with a inspiron mini i dont have an disc drive or the xp disk what should i do
Thank you so much. I had no idea what to do. I messed around with the menu for a while until I thought ” Why not Google it?” So I got on the internet on my phone and looked it up and this webpage was the first result. I followed your instructions exactly and it worked perfectly. Thank you for helping me fix my computer.
@WILLIAM
http://www.bootableusb.org/?p=57
This will solve your problem. During setup set it as “Create a USB drive with Windows XP/2003 Recovery Console” under Advanced Mode tab.
Hi I have this unmountable problem. How can I get my data off my hard drive first. A friend has dine some for me but he’s on holiday and I wanna do the rest.
Many thanks
Awesome ! thank you so much for your instructions, it worked like charm !
Had the Unmountable Boot Volume show up on a Dell Latitude D830. Tried this fix and it worked!!! Saved me from having to call in the outside IT guys who charge a fortune to fix. Thank you so much!!!