Can't run system restore or check disk please help

Hi i have a dell xps m1530 running on Windows Vista Home premium and yesterday wanted to do a system restore and this is what happened

System Restore gives me the following error when I try to go back to a restore point: "The disk Local Disk (C has errors. Windows has detected file system corruption on Local Disk (C. You must check the disk for errors before it can be restored."

It then gives me a link that says "Check the disk for errors". When I click on this, it says "Windows can't check the disk while in use" and gives me an option to "Schedule disk check".

However, when I schedule the disk check for the next restart, and then restart my computer, the disk check freezes after checking 2% of the files. I'm also unable to cancel the disk check (the starting page says it can be canceled by pressing any key... this doesn't work!). I must have restarted my computer about 10 times, the disk check failing to cancel AND freezing every single time, before I figured out how to restart with the last successful configuration.

I currently can use Windows without any errors - there are just some recent minor bugs that I find incredibly annoying, which is why I was attempting to use System Restore.

Is there any way I can get System Restore and/or the Disk Check to work?

check the disk with the manufacturer diagnostics, and run a chkdsk /r from the recovery console/command prompt.

how do i do that please explain as i never have had to do this thanks. Wil this sort out the problem or what else can i do what about a upgrade to windows 7 wil that sort it.

An OS upgrade won't help if you have a physical problem with the hard drive.
Go to the HDD manufacturer's website (Find the make/model number of your hard drive in the laptop bios or in Windows), download the tools (see if you can find a bootable CD ISO) and boot from that media.
You could also just download UBCD (Google it up) as it should have the manufacturer tools on that as well.
Do you have a Vista installation DVD (not a restore DVD but an actual installation DVD?) If you do, boot off of it (press F12 when your laptop starts up and select the optical drive). There's a screen when you enter the GUI setup portion where you can "Repair your computer". Select that. Then you want to eventually get to the command prompt where you would run chkdsk /r.
Do the Vista chkdsk after you have verified that the HDD is not physically defective.