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Tip #1973 - Stop lengthy Autochck at startup

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Q:
Every time I start up my computer, it says Check Disk and takes forever. How do I stop it?

A:

This seems to be going around. I've had several letters with this repetitive checking problem in the last two weeks. Sometimes this is the result of a previous improper shutdown, sometimes this is the result of an error on your disk. To find out if your disk is really ok or not, run a good third party utility like Fix-it Utilities 5.

If this is happening consistently, your computer has been otherwise behaving absolutely normally, and your PC checks out ok with the utility, your computer may just have a dirty volume bit set. No, don't grab rags and window cleaner. I just mean that a chunk (one volume, like a volume in an encyclopedia) of your disk's data doesn't look quite right to the Autochk program. The Autochk program then takes its time going over every square inch of that entire drive.

To stop this from continually happening, you can exclude volumes from the autochk. This does involve the registry and is serious, serious business. If you mess this up, you can give yourself one world full of possibly irrevocable hurting. This is an advanced user tip only. It's somewhat more user friendly than most registry tips because it runs from the command prompt, but the risk is equal.

First, as with any alteration of the registry, you should back up your registry, back up the rest of your computer, and set a Restore Point (see the end of this tip for instructions ).

Go to Start, Run, and type in cmd

Then type in
chkntfs /x c:

This will stop Autochk from scanning drive c. If your main drive is the D:\ then type
chkntfs /x d:

Close out of the command window when the next prompt appears, and that's it!

To undo this setting at a later point:

Go to Start, Run, and type in cmd

Then type in
chkntfs /d

Remember, this is only a solution for otherwise well-behaved systems whose drives check out clean with a good utility programs and who are consistently running lengthy checks during bootup. If your system does not meet all of these criteria, it's likely that something else is actually wrong.

~ Chris Fisher

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