Flooring Tile - Pulling up tiles on powder room

I am kind of a newbie, and I was trying to get some understanding on how to move forward. I am trying to redo a powder room ,and I did have a question. I am about 1/2 through pulling up all the tile, but here is what I'm seeing. I have what looks to be a cement board underneath the tiles. As I pull up the old tiles, I'm leaving parts of the cement, and I'm also pulling up some of the cement. So my guess is that I will need to replace the cement board once I am finished with the tiles. I really haven't seen any screws on the cement board, so is there a special technique for pulling this off? I assume that I will need to leave the subfloor in place. Or is there a way of just patching the cement board(then I can just get all the plaster off of the cement board). Any help you can provide would be appreciated.

Thanks.
Sony

I wonder if what you might have is a mud floor if you're not finding any screws or nails by the half way point. One way to tell is if the "cement board that came up has a layer of mesh attached or exposed on the areas that it has been damaged. Or, is it a whitish beige color. If you chip up a small section in a corner, how far down until you hit the wood subfloor and do you run into metal lath at the bottom of it? Post back and we'll continue from there.

Sorry to take so long to respond. I was out of town for the weekend. Yeah, I definitely see the wire mesh that you are talking about. I would think that the screws, or nails would be really obvious, but they are not. Is the best approach to get the cement board up, or is it worth it to just try to patch and level the floor, and then just put the new tiles on top of the cement board. I plan on putting down marble, if that matters.
Thanks.

How thick is this cement layer you are seeing. I'm trying to figure out if it's a real mud job (>1" thick, then your digging really deep) or just a lath and scratch method, where lath is stapled down and then just covered with thinset. If it's the later, then rip it all out, it's no good to begin with. Come back when your done and tell me what your subfloor is, and how thick, and in a bathroom, if there are any soft spots or signs of rot or mildew. If it's the former, then your probably pulling up too much of the mud bed. When all the tile is up, decribe wht's left in detail and it may (stress "may") be able to be repaired.