Need computer help!

[Ed]

I talked to a local computer guru and he also confirmed that my hard drive bit the dust. He said if I can't pull up the DIR from the C:\ then the hard drive is probably bad.

Now I have two options. I can take my computer to a shop here in town and they can fiddle with it for a couple of weeks. Or... I can go over to Wally World buy a new internal hard drive for 90 bucks and try to do it myself. Hmmm?? How hard can it be?

[Virto]

If the drive really is toast, there's no sense in handing it over to some people that will charge you for no reason.

A new drive fresh from the box will be auto identified by your BIOS, providing the computer was made sometime within the last 15 years. Since you were running XP, that sounds like a non-issue.

Now, do you actually HAVE the XP cd, or did your PC just come with a "system restore" cd? A lot of manufacturers actually keep all the windows files on the hard disk in a maintenence partition. If the hard drive dies, so does your copy of Windows. If that's the case, you can get ahold of a cd from someone near you. I figure you legitimately paid for it, I see no reason why you shouldn't have an honest to god copy.

Just make sure that the jumpers on the back of the drive are set to either MASTER or CABLE SELECT and the PC should do the rest, initially. Once you get everything going, you may need to visit your manufacturer's website for drivers.

[hls30.com]

Ed,

If you can get gas in a rental car with a locking gas cap, you can do this!

The drive will come with complete instructions, and I will give you my cell# is you happen to have problems.

Will

[ncz]

Also Ed, they can get the files off what is left of the hard drive. They have some sort of magic spell they perform on the thing. My computer would barely boot and when it did it was the ugliest screen and noise you had ever heard/seen. I was totally bummed about all of my work files but they got them back, so don't toss it!!! Good luck...OH,,Hey Will, how's it shakin

[webdawg1]

It's really not that hard.... When loading up the OS (Operating System) all you really need is the CD key off your XP CD. XP should pick up 98-99% (Perhaps 100%) of all your devices in your computer. You might have to download a driver for one or two devices, but other than that it pretty much painless. You've got more than enough help from all us gear heads to walk you through the process.....

webdawg1

[sblake01]

I talked to a local computer guru and he also confirmed that my hard drive bit the dust. He said if I can't pull up the DIR from the C:\ then the hard drive is probably bad.

Now I have two options. I can take my computer to a shop here in town and they can fiddle with it for a couple of weeks. Or... I can go over to Wally World buy a new internal hard drive for 90 bucks and try to do it myself. Hmmm?? How hard can it be?

That's not really true. What does the he mean by bad? It sounds like software to me not hardware and hence there drive is not 'bad'. I've fixed that same problem on my wife's computer w/o losing her info. If you lived closer, I bet I could fix yours. Are you using an XP cd while trying to run the system restore?

[owenk]

I cannot help but weigh in on this thread. I am a Desktop Support Engineer (Computer Geek) at a large dot com that survived the crash. If you work on cars you can work on computers. The best path is to purchase a 2nd hard drive.

I started to right up instructions but it would be easyer to speak with you. So now you have 2 of us that you can call. I will send you via PM my cell phone #

[jmark]

I had a similar problem losing a hard drive and the Geek Squad at Best Buy recovered everything off my old HD and installed me a new one for me.

[jmark]

As Andy Griffith once said, "Call the man Aunt Bea". Take your computer to local repair guru and have them copy what they can from your c drive on a disk(s). At least that way you will have most of your files left on something somewhere. My hard drive did the same and I must admit I am not as good as the guys here with debugging these things, so I was scared I would perform the wrong function and wipe the whole thing clean

I love that episode!

[Ed]

That's not really true. What does the he mean by bad? It sounds like software to me not hardware and hence there drive is not 'bad'. I've fixed that same problem on my wife's computer w/o losing her info. If you lived closer, I bet I could fix yours. Are you using an XP cd while trying to run the system restore?

Steve, I have the XP cd in the cd drive when It starts up. Then when I get to the system restore screen with the C:\ promt I will put in a command and it won't execute. I've tried to bring up a dir and it tells me that "An error occurred during directory enumeration".

It won't let me change directory either.

To all you other guys, thanks for the input. I really appreciate it. I believe I will go over to Wally world and pick up a new internal hard drive. If I can recover some of my files that would be great. And you guys make it sound like it's really easy so, I'm going to give it a shot.

Owenk, I got your PM.

Thanks guys.

[dogma420]

ED---

No matter what anyone says, I would highly recommend you at least test your hard drive--this problem for me has occurred on drives that are perfectly good and it's not an indication of a defective hard drive. The OS has a problem, more than likely a file is on a bad block. A bad block is NOT an indication of a bad hard drive. It's like a 'scratch' on a record. Many utilities such as checkdisk or scandisk check for bad blocks--they don't fix them literally, but they do make sure that the OS IGNORES them and doesn't use them to put data there. As long as data isn't put there, you're fine. A good hard drive may have many bad blocks. Brand new hard drives could have many bad blocks as well--it's not a measure of a good or bad drive.

And more than likely, if recovery console had worked, and you were able to put that file back that it was saying was corrupted, it would list another file on next boot up, and so on....

I'd recommend--testing the hard drive with some drive testing software, and if it's good, install Windows XP over itself.

Somebody recommending a new hard drive right off the bat is the 'service technician disease' IMO...most techs in a service company have to work quick, and to say 'just buy a new hard drive' is a quick way to fix the problem. It fixes it, but it isn't the most effecient fix for the consumer, and isn't necessary. It could be that you need a new hard drive, but more than likely you have a bad block with this data on it, nothing more. if OS reinstalls itself, it always does a checkdisk on the drive when installing the OS and will ignore the area with the bad block and not write data to it.

phew...enough writing!

[dogma420]

Go to this link:

http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm#DFT

Follow the instructions, although it is a Hitachi test, it will check ALL hard drives that are IDE, SATA, and SCSI (most scsi).

If the hard drive is an IBM or Hitachi drive, and it finds bad blocks, it will ask you if you want them repaired--say yes.

Bad blacks on a non IBM/Hitachi drive--you have to somehow run checkdisk on the drive to fix it.

To run checkdisk Ed:

1. slave drive into another system

2. Boot your desktop with Windows PE (a bootable version of Windows XP)

At command prompt type c:\chkdsk /f /r (both switches seem to do the same thing but I always just use both, which are for fixing)...for explanation of switches just type c:\chkdsk /? and press enter will explain what /f and /r mean.

Hope this stuff helps man.

PM me if you would like more personal help--and leave your phone # if need be and I'll call you.