Regularly I do a thorough SCANDISC and then DEFRAG. Iam NOT an expert but in know first to go offline, disable Norton AV and Norton Internet Security, disconnect printer from my old Toshiba 2100cds laptop, Stop Task Scheduler and then NORMALLY everything goes AOK. The only unusual thing I have done is renew Norton 2003 online. a day before the problems arose. What's Up?? Scandisc says I have restarted 10 times as Windows or another programme has been writing to this drive....? Quit running Programmes ...it says ..........How do you find out which programmes might be running when I have done the above -- someone please assist in PLAIN SIMPLE ENGLISH!!

have you tried scan disk and defrag in safe mode? I find it quicker as minimum programmes are running

Start, Run, type in msconfig. When it opens, click the startup tab. You should find your startup entries listed there. You can uncheck everything in there. (You might want to leave any video drivers (NOT Launchpads or similar) checked.) Remember or write down what you had checked so you can reload them later. Redo this process to recheck the entries. Close and reboot. Run scandskw on all your partitons, then run the defrag utility.

There's are also "run=" and "load=" lines in win.ini under the [windows] section.
These are usually used by hacking/malware, etc. Worth checking though. Normally,
there should be nothing after the equal sign on either.

Post back with any results or further questions.

I learnt something - all A OK - many thanks!!! RichardMH

Fixed - Many thanks for taking the trouble to reply RMH