the mysterious system file corruption

[liquidflame802]

I know my computer inside and out software and hardware wise but this just confused me. When the rare system file corrupt or missing error comes around I know exactly what to do, but this came up and I was stuck. I used my Windows recovery tool thing to repair the system file, but it was like there was no Windows OS ever installed on the thing. The partition information reads it's a FAT based partition, though it's an NTFS Windows XP partition, and when I go into the DOS based recovery tool it never brings me to C:\Windows nor will it let me change the directory to it, so I can't provide admin info to get through. I'm unable to do anything to bring up the Windows folder and replace the corrupted system file. I have a separate partition for Windows Vista, but the boot record won't even get accessed for me to choose between OS. I'm just met with "Invalid Partition Table".

System has a SATA 250gb hard drive that is still functional, checked on my other computer and it reads the disk, the data, everything.

Is there any way I can possibly replace the system files running through a separate partition or computer completely? I'm not quite ready to back up and wipe my drive just yet.

 

[berry120]

If one PC is complaining about an invalid partition table and is barely reading the disk, yet another one reads it perfectly, that's not a sign of damaged system files - if the partition table was really that corrupted then the other computer wouldn't be able to read it either.

I'd suggest grabbing this: http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/ and then running badblocks (I think it's under hard disk tools.) If it reports that almost every block on the disk is bad, that would point to a motherboard or cable issue in my mind - perhaps try it in a different SATA slot and with a different cable?