Re: Need help with HDD issue on Dell Inspirion 5160


S.Lewis wrote:
"steveo" <gnsemail@xxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1148597421.700216.92430@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Hello, All--

I have a Dell Inspirion 5160 laptop (P4HT 2.8 / 512 / BIOS A08 / about
1.5 yrs old) that recently stopped working. While I was playing a
DirectX game, suddenly the screen went to a blue screen with a message
that said that to protect my system, the computer was going to shut
itself off. Of course, it didn't work when I restarted it. I got a
message "hard disk read failure" after the (thorough) POST completed
successfully.


Ok, HDD failure, I thought.


I got Dell to send me another one. Slapped in the refurb disk they
sent--no dice. Got the same message.


Lame. I then ran the Dell diagnostic tests they ship on CD with their
boxes and all came up clean as far as the procesor, cache, memory, bus,

etc etc etc are concerned. There were no tests for the HDD.



(snip)

Steve,

Try this: boot into BIOS and verify that the new hard drive is seen. You
should see some brand/model info with the capacity shown.

The BIOS reports "42GB" as the only information. This is true for both
HDD (the original, potentially damaged, and the replacement Dell sent).
No Manu, Model, or SN are reported.

I'm not sure if it used to report something different or not. To
verify that the BIOS was correctly identifying attached hardware, I
booted up with no HDD, and it correctly recognized that there was no
fixed disk.

Secondly, there *are* HDD tests on the diag CD. With most Dell versions the
HDD test (smart, verify, confidence and read tests) are the last to be run.
If the test locks up, it will not throw an error message.

On the copy of the disks I have, the last test tests the IDE interface
for the CD/DVD ROM on my machine. Perhaps it does not list the test
because 'there is no HDD in my system' (as far as it is concerned)? I
again ran them all and all checked out ok.

If the drive isn't seen in BIOS, it could be bent pins or a damaged adapter,
or a bad controller. The diag CD won't tell you anything more than what
you're seeing if that's the case.

Since the BIOS is picking up the fact that there is (or is not) a fixed
disk in place, then it is neither a bad controller or bent pins,
correct? Would it have been possible for the pins to have become bent
or damaged without me 'messing around' with the HDD previously?

If the drive is seen, then boot to the diag CD. Choose "custom test" / check
the box for "non-interactive test", and then select the hard drive test from
the left-hand column.

Again, no HDD test. I'd send a photo from my digicam, but this is
Usenet and not a binaries group :-)

Post back.

Thanks for the ideas. Based on my report, any other ideas?

One of my more geeky friends suggested that maybe the new HDD won't
register because it is improperly formated--a problem with the MBR or
FAT or something. Being a refurb, I guess this seems possible. Could
this be the problem?

steveo

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: My miserable experiences in testing and "removing" the "Acronis [alleged] True Image 11 Home" Ba
    ... specific interest is with reference to a disk imaging program (as opposed to ... a disk cloning program), I would assume that your *basic* objective is ... source HDD so that if the recipient of the clone is an internal HDD, ... large-capacity hard drives we do not feel this advantage is of major import ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.general)
  • Re: need a good backup method or program
    ... I have gone with the Casper 4.0 option, it is very user friendly and gives me exactly ... I'm assuming you've had little or no experience with disk imaging/disk ... that cloned HDD will be bootable and its data immediately accessible, ... Note, however, that should the recipient of the clone be a USB or Firewire ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.general)
  • Re: Setting up an external hard drive - partioning and sharing issues
    ... program involving some hundreds of disk -cloning operations... ... day-to-day working HDD to another HDD, ... complete clone of the source disk, ... HDDs involved in the disk-cloning operation are the *identical* drives ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.help_and_support)
  • Re: OT-True Image Backup
    ... Make sure the USB drives file system is NTFS and not FAT32.. ... Jaymon is correct in that the disk image you create and save to the D: ... partition of your USB external HDD will have no effect on the other ... Step-by-Step Instructions for Using the Acronis True Image Program to Backup ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.help_and_support)
  • Re: Sticky Computer Problem:
    ... I can't recommend any of the preassembled external drives. ... can take to back up the entire contents of one's day-to-day working HDD, ... Creating disk images ... can be either a USB or Firewire or SATA external HDD. ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.general)