Missing hard drive. please confirm.

[pappajohn]

i tried to boot my PC last night but it dont work.

starts to boot then the monitor shuts down though the tower is still running.

got into the bios and cmos setup and found this....

not a very clear photo but ...........

the second line reads......Pri Master Disc : None

the third line reads....... Pri Slave Disc : None

the bottom line says it all, dunnit oh:

Now someones gonna spoil my day and say me hard drives done a bunk, aint you.

 

[656]

Afternoon

You need to reboot your PC and get into the BIOS - normally either Del, f10 or f11 depending on who made it - that screen is not the BIOS screen. You should then have a screen letting you select Auto config for your hard drive(s). After selecting the auto config bit, exit and save setting. Reboot PC and it should all go well. If the HDD is shot, get another IDE one from Maplins. Mind you, dependi9ng on the age of the PC it could be a SATA drive

 

[pappajohn]

Afternoon

You need to reboot your PC and get into the BIOS - normally either Del, f10 or f11 depending on who made it - that screen is not the BIOS screen. You should then have a screen letting you select Auto config for your hard drive(s). After selecting the auto config bit, exit and save setting. Reboot PC and it should all go well. If the HDD is shot, get another IDE one from Maplins. Mind you, dependi9ng on the age of the PC it could be a SATA drive

hi,
just tried that and got the same screen which is, ofcourse, the boot screen.

tried it twice with the same result. 'Disc Boot Failure, insert system disc and press enter'

as soon as i save and exit the monitor switches off. re-boot and it does the same again.

new hard drive me thinks.

strange thing....the boot screen says its an IDE drive but the manual says its a 250gb SATA drive oh:

just thinking ...i did get a message on boot up when this first started saying ' one of your discs is corrupted' or something similar.

 

[Linda and Steph]

Just wondering - Did you get some sort of restore / backup CD?

 

[sinbad1]

Check there is power to your hard drive + IDE ribbon is secure , worth checking ;but suspect the drive may be at fault.
Try any of the 'F' keys - (F1, F2, F10 are common) or the 'Del' key to enter your bios

Regards

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[pappajohn]

Just wondering - Did you get some sort of restore / backup CD?

unfortunatly no.

i had a new motherboard fitted a couple of years ago and didnt get a system recovery disc.
the PC came with one but the 'man' said it wont work with the new board so i'v never tried it.

i do have the option of the inbuilt recovery facility but that completely wipes the hard drive and if i can recover it i can backup all my files then use that.

think its knackered.

 

[pappajohn]

Thinking......the hard drive has been whistling loudly just recently.
dont know if that has any bearing on it.

 

[pappajohn]

Check there is power to your hard drive + IDE ribbon is secure , worth checking ;but suspect the drive may be at fault.
Try any of the 'F' keys - (F1, F2, F10 are common) or the 'Del' key to enter your bios

Regards

cheers sinbad...i'll check that as well. anythings worth a try.

 

[Wildman]

Hi, if you boot from a seperate disk you may be able to access the hard drive to enable a backup. you can then do a system resinstall. Nowt to lose by trying.
Good luck

 

[pappajohn]

Hi, if you boot from a seperate disk you may be able to access the hard drive to enable a backup. you can then do a system resinstall. Nowt to lose by trying.
Good luck

please explain roger. oh:

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[sinbad1]

cheers sinbad...i'll check that as well. anythings worth a try.

beg steal or borrow a XP or Vista disk put the disk in reboot to get options repair/reinstall ;but ?

If your hard drive was noisy then it would suggest possible failure, if this is the case then i'm not sure you would be able to recover any of your data.

If your restore relies on a hidden partition on your drive , this also would not be accessable.

You could remove the drive and attach it to another pc as a slave ( worth a try but doubt it will work)

There are speciallists that can recover your data ;but at a price

 

[Geo]

Just had a thought John
This same problem had me going for an hr or two on mine one day
Turns out, leaving camera card in printer when booting up causes it every time on my systemoh:

 

[American Dream]

Firstly I'd slave the drive on another pc.

If it's SATA then there's no problem.Just plug it into the next SATA socket available.

If it's PATA then it'll have to have the jumpers set to either Master of Slave on the IDE ribbon as appropriate.

Make sure the bios is set to look for all ide drives if appropriate.

If the drive is accessible then copy any data you can to a good drive.

I normally use a sata usb device for this.

Here's a good tip.Works a lot of the time for me at work.

Connect the drive to another pc.

Run a chkdsk on the drive.Very often the master boot record or File allocation table becomes corrupt.

Otherwise try running a new install from an operating system cd.

Go for the repair option.

At the command prompt type FIXBOOT.

If this doesnt work then the next time type FIXMBR.

Quit honestly, if your drive is making some nasty clicking noises i'd really think about changing it.

 

[pappajohn]

Now sorted

Run a chkdsk on the drive.Very often the master boot record or File allocation table becomes corrupt.


Quit honestly, if your drive is making some nasty clicking noises i'd really think about changing it.

hi steve,

the problem WAS in the boot file allocations. a number of files had been corrupted.
managed to load 'optimized files' from the bios screen.
it deleted about 4 files and re-wrote them.
it then booted ok.

i shut down and restarted then went back to bios to check the disc.
the guy who fitted the new motherboard had reconnected the hard drive as a slave, not the primary.oh:

as for the noise....it wasnt clicking. it was a high pitched whistle, but this appears to have stopped now...just a very faint whine but you need to get yer lug on the case to hear it.

 

[American Dream]

Glad you're sorted now John.

The guy who fitted the new motherboard had reconnected the hard drive as a slave, not the primary.

oh:

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[pappajohn]

Just had a thought John
This same problem had me going for an hr or two on mine one day
Turns out, leaving camera card in printer when booting up causes it every time on my systemoh:

cheers Geo,

checked all the other drives/card slots for 'renegade' discs/cards and all were empty.
sorted now.....see last post. :thumb:

 

[pappajohn]

Glad you're sorted now John.

oh:

that was two years ago steve but its been running ok 'til now.:thumb:

 

[pappajohn]

turned it on again last night and its gone for good......

noticed a securing screw had come out of the graphics card socket plate and the card was loose so removed and refitted the card and now got no monitor at all.
when i notice the card was loose i moved it while powered up and the puter turned off instantly then started again as i moved it back and forth.
its 4/5 years old now so i think its time for a replacement PC.

 

[hilldweller]

Thinking......the hard drive has been whistling loudly just recently.
dont know if that has any bearing on it.

It would depend on what it was whistling.

Amazing Grace would be a worry they do that when they don't have any bearings.

 

[hilldweller]

as for the noise....it wasnt clicking. it was a high pitched whistle, but this appears to have stopped now...just a very faint whine but you need to get yer lug on the case to hear it.

That sounds like a cooling fan to me. Moving the PC usually stops it for a while. You can often oil them.

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[hilldweller]

when i notice the card was loose i moved it while powered up and the puter turned off instantly then started again as i moved it back and forth.

That is perfectly acceptable - power off, take it out, buff the contacts with dry kitchen roll, replace firmly, screw down and power up.

It's a good time to buy a new box though, they've never been cheaper.

 

[pappajohn]

cheers Brian, ill give it a go but im slowly losing faith in it. :Sad:

 

[Douglas]

If you have data on the hard drive that you dont have backups of and you dont want to lose it then take care, if you do the wrong thing you could lose the disk contents

Maybe it might be better to get someone how know what they are doing to look at it.

Doug

 

[Bulletguy]

....its 4/5 years old now so i think its time for a replacement PC.

John......know how you feel mate.

Just before Christmas i had hellish probs with my pc and did about three re-formats till eventually found it was the hard drive at fault (it eventually went totally bang and never worked again!). I replaced it with a new 80gb ide drive from PC World which at £34 wasn't cheap....you can pick up 80 or 120gig from computer fairs for £19, but i needed mine asap.

I run two drives on my pc, the 80 as the main drive and a 120 as a dump though i also have a 640gb external i'm now busy with transferring everything off the dump as that will be the next drive to go down. I bought the 640 from PC World who were selling them at £58.69, or you could pay 2 pence more for a 500gb which doesn't make much sense!

My PC is a Dell bought new 5 and a half years ago and to be perfectly honest i would buy another. The build quality is top notch. Yes you can buy cheaper pc's than Dell, but to get those prices low they use cheap crap components and waste money fitting silly flashing lights to make the package look attractive.

 

[pappajohn]

If you have data on the hard drive that you dont have backups of and you dont want to lose it then take care, if you do the wrong thing you could lose the disk contents

Maybe it might be better to get someone how know what they are doing to look at it.

Doug

hopefully 95% of everything thats on the PC is also on my lappy and the stuff that isnt is useless junk anyway.

after this amount of time i dont even know what a lot of it relates to anymore.oh:
i used to do regular backup to discs but you know how it is......other things take priority and it gets forgotten:Blush:

shirl has the same PC so im gonna nick her graphics card and bung it in mine just to check if thats the problem.:thumb:

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[Douglas]

hopefully 95% of everything thats on the PC is also on my lappy and the stuff that isnt is useless junk anyway.:

I use a external HD, cost aboubt £60.00 its on a usb connection so its just plug and play, you can also use it for more than one computer..


Doug,

 

[Wildman]

please explain roger. oh:

Hi John, I know it is sorted now, so now is a good time to create a boot disk. Then is it happens again you can boot seperately from that disk and sort through the problems.

 

[pappajohn]

Hi John, I know it is sorted now, so now is a good time to create a boot disk. Then is it happens again you can boot seperately from that disk and sort through the problems.

think you missed a few posts mate.......its died altogether.