Any computer has to be restarted from time to time to complete updates, right? This one in question is now asking to be restarted to update McAfee. Guess some day I'll just grit my teeth, cover my eyes, and go for it.

Sure, updates can be beneficial. I am just saying that IF the laptop has issues with the reboot process then just leave it on unless you want to reboot it...no harm done.

But, you may save a couple dollars a month and help the environment a little by shutting it down, or you could just turn down the AC a degree

6 in one, half a dozen in the other.

With laptops I mainly have a concern about possible overheating.

I've seen people having their laptop sitting on a pile of papers on their desk or on a bed== fire!!

Good point! If the fan(s) are blocked the hard drive will overheat and cause this exact problem...

Kinda like a car! If it ain't cooled it will quit....

This sounds a bit mad, but to check whether it is a read/write issue due to heat. Try turning it on and then even if it doesn't boot, leave it on for it to warm up.

The 'platters' of a hard drive (disks where the data is stored) do expand or contract depending on their temperature, so if you have shut it down while it was roasting and then gone for a boot up when it is cold, it may not find the sectors it is after.

I remember 'back in the days' (floppy disks and LS120 disks are the same) I would put a uni assignment on a disk (that I had probably been up all night, writing last minute! ) and then walk the 2-3 mile journey to class, in the standard Scottish weather (snow!). On inserting the now half frozen disk into the machine it would not read, however half an hour later once it was warm, it was fine.

Worth a try!

If by some miracle this works, download the free program 'speedfan' and see what temperature your system and HDD is running at. This may highlight a poorly performing fan or poor air circulation.

Sounds like the boot sequence is set to boot from cdrom and not the hard drive.

Restart (or turn on) laptop.
Press F11 as soon as it starts up (before the beep). This should take you to the bios menu.
Look for "boot"order or something similar (not entire sure what HP's exact words are).
Enter that menu and you should see 2 options (maybe 3 but probably not).

Option 2 (you probably won't see option 1) is CDROM
Option 3 is hard drive or notebook hard drive.

Set option 2 to the hard drive (hdd) or notebook hard drive by either pressing the right arrow key, or enter.
Setp option 3 to CDROM

Reboot. If after a couple of days you stop having issues you should be good to go If you have issues still (you might have a corrupt master boot record "MBR") and have the windows cd follow the steps below.


Insert the Windows Disc into CD (or DVD) drive.
Turn off the laptop.
Turn on the laptop.
Press the Enter key when prompted to Boot from CD .
From the Windows Setup Menu, press the R key to start the Recovery Console.
At the C:\> prompt type FIXMBR then press the Enter key to continue.
Press the y key then press Enter when asked if you want to write a new MBR.
Once it's done restart the laptop.

Wow, thanks everyone! So much to try now.

RobinM, I just love your kitty's film clip!

Finally gritted my teeth and went for it. When it was offered I hit the F10 key, and....nothing happened. Black screen for a few moments then the dreaded OPERATING SYSTEM NOT FOUND.

It was working fine all day today till I restarted to update McAfee. Last time I restarted, it came back to life normally.

I'll take the battery out again, leave it till tomorrow, and I bet it starts back up like nothing happened. Good thing it's just my BF's toy.

On the 2nd attempt this morning the self-test is running.

Fingers are crossed. Not sure why as I don't know what I'm hoping for...

Here's what the screen said after the test:

(S.M.A.R.T.)ve)
100% Complete
(Quick) Pass
(Comprehensive) Pass
(S.M.A.R.T.) Pass
Hit any key to exit (I hit the space bar)

next screen:
Test Status #10000 Passed

asked if I wanted to save or edit Configuration; I chose Save.

Then it started up normally. We'll see what happens next time I have to restart. I'm not going to do it until it is requested!

Thanks everyone!