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<\/p>\nI’m going to tell a story that probably many of you can relate to.<\/p>\n
Last week, I experienced a slow motion catastrophic failure in Windows. It surprise me because ever since Windows 7, I’ve had pretty good luck in rolling forward with the updates and upgrades of the OS. But, that changed when I moved to the Windows 10 Creator Update.<\/p>\n
As Microsoft posted in its website, “Why wait? Download Creator’s Update now.” So I did.<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, it started with problems with an old NVIDIA Ti 470 graphics card. More importantly, I couldn’t run a Samsung Android virtual machine with VirtualBox due to a problem in a VirtualBox network adapter driver.<\/p>\n
I tried the usual: reinstalling VBox, some registry edits of some VBox settings, and sanity checks on the OS and disk drives. But, no matter what I tried, I couldn’t get VBox working.<\/p>\n
Biting the bullet, I decided on increasingly drastic measures: a roll back to a previous restore point; a Windows 10 Reset (keeping user files). While the VBox problem was fixed, Windows broke in the process: I couldn’t use Windows 10 Start and type in “cmd” to run a shell.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
In desperation, I decided to try\u00c2\u00a0a full Windows 10 Reset (removing all user files), but stopped\u00c2\u00a0immediately when Windows prompted whether I wanted to delete all data from all drivers in\u00c2\u00a0the machine! Really?? Being old school, I decided just to do a format\/install fresh copy of the OS instead. I know, so “old school”.<\/p>\n
In the end, I was able to get the PC back up and restore my files. But, I learned a few things\u00c2\u00a0about the tools MS offers to fix a Windows.<\/p>\n
Verifies the validity of Windows system files.<\/p>\n\n
<\/pre>\nBasic File System Integrity<\/h2>\n
Chkdsk — Checks a disk and displays a status report<\/h3>\n
This tool checks the validity of a file system. It used to check for bad sectors in a drive, but that is no longer performed by the tool.<\/p>\n\n
Bad Disk Drive Checks<\/h2>\n
There are a number of free tools<\/a> which check for bad sectors on a hard disk drive (HDD). You should not use these tools on solid state drives (SSD) as these checks shorten the life of the SSD.<\/p>\n
Many of the tools are manufacturer-specific programs. For example, Seatools<\/a> is specific for Seagate drives.\u00c2\u00a0Sandisk SSD Dashboard<\/a> is specific for Sandisk.\u00c2\u00a0Macrorit Disk Scanner<\/a> seems pretty good tool with a colorful GUI to boot, and is not manufacturer specific.<\/p>\n
Windows trouble shooter<\/h2>\n
Windows provides some trouble shooting programs to help detect and fix problems. You can operate them from the GUI, or the command line.<\/p>\n\n
<\/p>\n
DISM\u00c2\u00a0–\u00c2\u00a0Deployment Image Servicing and Management tool<\/h3>\n
DISM enumerates, installs, uninstalls, configures, and updates features
\n and packages in Windows images.<\/p>\n\nAdditional\u00c2\u00a0examples:<\/h4>\n
dism \/online \/cleanup-image \/checkhealth\r\ndism \/online \/cleanup-image \/scanhealth\r\n\r\n<\/pre>\nWindows Driver Verifier<\/h2>\n
Verifier.exe is a tool to check drivers installed on your system. It is a Desktop GUI application. Be very careful with this program: you can easily trash your system using the tool–from the voice of experience! Make sure to create a backup before proceeding. A good intro is here<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Recreate a Profile<\/h2>\n