Hard drive/laptop question?
 

Is it typical to lose a hard drive on a laptop after only 3 yrs?
(bios = Sept 06-- Dell)

We have never lost a hard drive (except when one blew up with a power pack failure)... We don't carry this laptop around that much.

Hubby couldn't boot it up this morning. We thought the cat had walked on it while it was doing a scan last night? But my son over the phone is looking up the error messages and says the hard drive is dead. :confused:

Jo, is it worth fixing? Luckily we backed it up a few months ago, son doesn't think he can clone it. But he said he could put in a new one. Or should we spring for a new one? Any thoughts?

It is common for things like hard drives to go out in laptops because of heat issues. Laptops arent the best at cooling because of the limited space inside.

It is a fairly easy fix as you just take a couple of screws and it pops right out. You can google your laptop to see exactly how to change this out. I would think it is worth changing it if you like the laptop, plus it is much cheaper than replacing the whole thing. :winky:

I would compare prices , cpu/speed & ram/hard drive sizes of the new laptops out there {sales .. :)} and decide if it is worth fixing the old one or buying a new one.

Do you have a restore disk you could try ??
or doesn't the drive make any sounds at all..

we have been very pleased with http://www.newegg.com/

prices always seem really good compared with others and often free shipping too! They have excellent phone support as well so one can ask questions bf purchasing

Hubby tried the restore disc... no go.

As soon as he cruised the website for Dell (and saw the $289 discount) that was it. (1/2 what we paid for 3 yrs ago).

A new machine with tons more stuff, 3Gig RAM and 250Gig hd, etc he was sold. I think he will order it tomorrow. And it might come before Xmas. ( I am making him "sleep" on the problem.)

We are looking at 9 hr battery. That is the only perk, + dark blue cover ($40).

I guess we have both become computer addicts! :o
It was really acting up on vacation....battery died, keys sticking, slow, etc.

My son can get a new HD for $60 thereabouts. So the plan is to get the new one, and then at my son's convenience, he will install a new HD. Then that old one will be a back up. Maybe I can lie in bed now with that, and come here! Wouldn't that be something! LOL

I am so glad I forced him to get the new back up... at least My Documents are saved!

It has sure been some exciting moments here today. I had no idea my husband was sooooo attached to that laptop!

And there goes my new camera...which I have wanted for 2 yrs now. Maybe that will come down in price by next year?
All the money we save with my seeds this spring should help with the cost. I hope.

This has exhausted me... I'm going to bed!

Thanks for the comments, everyone!

9 hr battery???

Awesome!

You can replace the hdd though - if I did it, anyone can, really! I bought a Western Digital when mine hit the skids, Took me a few mins to put it in plus a little while to set the machine back up (you know, files and all). And it's been just fine ever since.

I think the replacements are far superior to the stock hdds.

And yeah, if you're not using the laptop, you'll get to love that. I miss mine something fierce - dh has it.

Anyone use a laptop cooling device/stand?

Allen? Jo?

It is interesting that this happened when the room was COLD.

Hubby does leave it on overnight alot, esp when doing scans.
This died during an AdAware scan.

Today hubby is looking on the net for laptop cooling stands and reviews. For example the Belkin offered by Dell has terrible reviews on Amazon. But there are others.

The error message is :
windows\system32\config\system is missing or corrupt
My son says the system is working enough to give this, but not accept the restore disc?

Now hubby has been seduced into a new sparkling version. We were not going to do $$ for Xmas except for our son. Now that has changed. Our 3yr old one was pretty clunky compared to what there is now. And we are talking about $500! And it won't come before Xmas, since it has to be "built". The shipping is free also.

And yes, I really think the 9hr batt is necessary. It is only $40 more. Ours died on vacation, so we could only run it on electricity which is a huge challenge. We just bought an Energizer 6hr external battery thingy from Woot a month ago for vacation. It will run our cell phones, and computer etc. We did that rather than get a new computer batt...so I am glad Woot offered that one day very low price for it. We had been using an external car battery charger to recharge the phones, but it doesn't have enough juice to run a computer. (you should see the stuff we take into the laundromat to charge off their wall plugs as it is!)

We did run it off our generator a few times on vacation. I wonder if that is the reason it died? Is generator power safe for computers? My son said the power cord would protect the laptop and the generator is small, and goes thru surge protectors at the plug in.(the house is not wired)

If mine seems to be getting warm or if I am running it quite a bit.. then I just prop it up with something to get more air flow underneath - keep the fan vent opening clear.

I usually use CD cases under each corner.

I think generators should be OK, esp with the extra power bar for surge suppression.. we ran our well, water heater , big TV & fridge at the same time last year with the generator.

windows error info-
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307545

Thanks, Jo. I talked to my son today, and he found the same link. Our problem appears to be that the discs that came with the laptop won't boot at all. He said he would have to look at it in person...etc. We can't do it this weekend, and so hubby is chomping at the bit to get a new one anyway...He WANTS it, and you know what that means...LOL.
We have the back up storage, which can be downloaded into the new one. All of My Documents. This new one will have Windows 7 too.

I can put Paint shop pro on it, like I did from this one..so that is all that matters. Anything else we can move from this main one with a flash drive. To me it is rather overwhelming... so I will let THEM do it all. I don't have the mind/head for all this.:rolleyes:
The biggest problem last time with the first laptop was activating the Wifi. We'll let my son do that one!;)

I do not use a stand or cooler, but I put it on a hard surface, not my lap or a pillow so it vents okay.

And I shut it down when not in use - dd did not and hers was always a problem.

I use it without a surge protector, but I would use a SP in your case, with a generator. House current can be oddball enough, I would not bet on a genny keeping a steady current, or the laptop's cord being able to protect it.

I wonder if you can get it to boot from disc if you go to the boot menu and manually set it to do so - I had to to something like that with mine when it crashed. It kept setting itself to some other boot sequence.

:confused:

Which is how I learned they have a boot menu, lol.

My ds got it to come around just enough to save my files. But the hdd was toast.

I think when you first turn it on, you can hit f12 or something to get to that menu.

I'm pretty sure, if I remember right, that after I put the new hdd in, I had to do this, too. Would be nice if I could remember any dang thing.

:o

Thanks for the tips. We tended to leave that laptop on because it was a pain to get the wifi started. The new one will definitely be turned off at night.

It is important to me to have my graphics program on there, and we are considering Adobe maybe ...but if I can weasel my Paint shop pro back on there (don't tell on me), that will be enough for me. The laptop is really for hubby...and since he is so helpful and is supporting us 100% now that I am not working... who am I to say, no? We take it on vacation... and that is when I use it most. Sometimes in the night I use it if I can't sleep and don't want to brave the stairs at 2am. Going up and down really then wakes me up and I have wasted a sleep time.

We did the F12 thing...nada. My son thinks the HD is totally dead. He said he'll try to resurrect it. We'll take it to him sometime after Xmas so he can work on it at his convenience. His job is releasing a new software product and he is totally stressed and tired with the moving into the new house and all on top of that. He is the bug tester...and feels it is really a big responsibility to catch ALL the bugs!

So hubby is sharing the main machine downstairs where I typically work. He insists on using HIS side, so there is alot of logging off here etc. I always just used his side on the laptop, but he won't do that here. So logging off back and forth is a pain of sorts. He is going to put our finances on this machine from the backup... since this one has the software on it. That way we can move to the new laptop with a flash drive. He made spread sheets showing our retirement situation and it is pretty nifty. It is easy then to see trends and move things etc. That way we don't lose much by mistake. So today he will be starting that back moving and I won't be online as much as before.

Hi mrsD, sounds like your about to make a new purchase!! That is so cool! You probably wont have the wireless problems on the new one because it is all built in, and especially if it is Windows 7. That OS takes all the hard stuff out and just connects like a breeze.

I have used those cooling stands, it made me feel like it was safer but it started makin noises and I havent used it since LOL. Best is to not put it on top of bed, pillows, clothes, or anything that will constrict the air flow.

Here is a video on how to change out the hdd in the old one in casr you might want to do that later on for a back up puter :winky:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xg_EhfPcZX4

You will be totally surprised at the ease LOL!

Oh, that's cool.... thanks!
Getting a new computer is rather exciting, I agree! LOL;)

Another way to check it once you get the new laptop... I bought a hard drive caddy on ebay I think it cost around $10 with shipping. It has a usb cable with it. I took the HD out of my old laptop and hooked it to the new one and was very thankfully able to retreive all of my old files. And now I use that drive as a backup and I can plug it into any computer and it pulls right up.

I mention this because the old one sounds like it could be more of a partition issue than the hard drive.

I will say this much for dell.... The dog knocked a glass of lemonade over on my latitude fried the keyboard...but it still worked. Then my DH2B's DD came to visit and she was using my computer to watch movies...apparently she fell asleep and knocked a glass of tea over on the table that my laptop sat in overnight... it took a while to dry but it kept right on chugging...until I dropped a glass and a few tiny drops of tea hit the keyboard and THAT was the final straw and the dead of my 5 yr old dell that I bought used to begin with. I will say that was one tough little machine!

Another word of caution...that tough little machine downloaded a virus while mcaffee was updating when i left it running overnight. Try not to leave it connected to the internet when you go to bed.

Not made to last long.
Should be cheap to replace though.
Both my desktop hard drives failed in under 2 years. Luckily with warranty.
Got it home and then the DVD burner failed.
bit late now, but next time-Always get extended warranty with computers as there are so many individual components.

I use a cooling pad w/my laptop. Important to keep in mind is if one is used, make sure that the fans (computer and pad) don't work in conflicting directions.

And, the HD - along with the RAM - on one of my laptops completely fried only a few months after I received it (as a gift). The manufacturer replaced the parts, yet I had to be totally assertive and go up the "food chain."

The machine wouldn't do a darn'd thing - to enable recovery of data - until I purchased a program that works as a boot from the CD/DVD drive. Before replacing the HD, etc., I recovered everything I wanted and kept/packed the old drive.

We have a second puzzle:

Hubby brought down the back up for that laptop (which used to be on this machine, before we bought the new Seagate one).

So he could move our finances to here until the new laptop comes --estimated delivery Dec. 22. (it is in transit now)

So last night he did an Avast complete scan and it found a trojan?

Win32AGENT-AICW[trj]

The I may be l... can't tell. Could this be why the laptop crashed?

I did a search for this and could not find it. I got up at 4:30am today and came down here, and found the AVAST stopped on it, and so I copied and sequestered it in the chest. (the typical action).

Any experience with this? Is it just a low virulence thing?

Any trojan isn't a good sign.


I know I'd not re-install "infected" programs or files, though.

Well, the new laptop came today. It was suggested to arrive today and it did...by FedEx which seems to never deliver to us properly in the past. Good thing I was here... I'm going out tomorrow to WalMart for some candy and extraneous things for Xmas at my son's house.

Hubby is showing great restraint in opening the box, which I saved for him (he was on an audit today). He is still on the Federal clock so to speak.
I suspect tonight will be a busy long night ;)

Here's a virus list with many Win32AGENT -maybe you can find the one or type it in to se what it says about it.
http://www.viruslist.com/en/index.html

Thanks Jo... but I am one big nebish with this stuff!

Can't find it on there... booooohoooo

Anyway hubby says it was on SeaGate backup....

If that is true then it was on the main computer at one time. I've looked on Avast sites, and you know I don't have a mind for this!

I sequestered it. Whatever it is.

When you mention sequestered, do you mean, Quarantined? or Isolated? (still within data/files?)

I'd get the "thing" gone from every source where it's displaying :). (As in dumping, deleting, trashing it.)

Really bites that you're having to go through this.

What is odd is that it only showed up in Seagate...which is the backup for the main computer. It didn't show up on the main computer at all. (I thought it was on the other back up since that is what was running at the time). The last time I scanned stuff hugely (with other programs) was during the Conflictor thing. At that time I did both the backup and HD of this tower Dell, and it took 8hrs. A few months before that I did a Trend Micro House call. The MS conflictor scan found one item and removed it. Same with Micro House call. Our Avast scanned as usual every week the big scan and never found anything. Why this was on the backup of the new Seagate and not on here is a mystery? :confused:

Avast has a "store in chest" feature. They recommend squestering things. Many times what they find is a false positive etc. I'll keep looking for that file. I just haven't had a block of time to do it, since hubby has been using this one quite a bit.

I always have a backup hard drive hooked up incase of a failure. I have a western digital, ibook. It works really well with apple time machine to keep information secure.