Do I need a new hard drive?

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Kyle Miller

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Jul 11, 2013
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My specs:
Motherboard: asus m5a99fx pro r2.0

CPU: fx-4130

RAM: 8Gigs of Kingston Hyperx Blu 2 x 4gb

Video card: GTX 460

Hard drive: SEAGATE 1.5TB SATA2 7200RPM 32MB hard drive

Operating System: MICROSOFT Windows 7

Very much a budget build so I don't want to spend that much more, but it has been working fine but the other day it was acting really slow. Steam started crashing, couldn't start any games and even was slow in the documents. That is why I started to think it was a hard drive problem. I restarted my computer and now it won't even boot. It says ""BIOS settings do not fully support the boot device".
It says to change a setting in the bios menu, which I can get into but doesn't even show my hard drive as a boot priority possibility.

I am looking to get the Samsung 840 evo 120gb, but if my hard drive is done I need more memory.

Thank you everyone in advance
 
Solution
Chicano
Is that the Windows Repair without a disk?.. If so, try the Windows Repair with the disk. If it fails, try Safe Mode, and if that also fails, the next thing to try is the Reinstall...

So, try booting in Safe Mode... If you're able to logon, run the System Restore...

If still unable to logon, next up is:
a) A Repair Install,
b) A dual boot installation
c) Or a format-and-clean installation...

You want to avoid a), b) even less, so c) is your best option if you have enough disk space.

If you have at least 20 GB of free disk space, create a new partition... to create it, you can use a Live CD Partition Manager, a Hirens Boot CD, a Linux distro, or even a Windows disk but it would be the last thing to try because it has a very...
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Chicano

Chicano

Judicious
Aug 29, 2011
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The HD may have a bad/corrupted MBR... if you can connect the HD to another computer via USB or as internal slave, or with a Live CD (for example with Hiren's Boot CD) try with a Partition Recovery program, to repair the MBR.

The message: "BIOS settings do not fully support the boot device" clearly indicates it's a BIOS issue... a HD issue would say something else or would not even detect a HD without giving any message. Try resetting the BIOS so the default settings take over. ALSO, Try the "IDE Native" HD controller Setting. That solved it here: http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-1628812/hdd-bios-uefi-boot-devices.html

On another Toms Hardware post the issue was a disconnected Hard Drive, still another one was that the user had not installed a hard drive. So try another SATA cable... or interchange it with optical drive cable

It was a deffective SATA cable here: http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/76482-asus-crosshair-v-formula-z-the-current-bios-setting-do-not-fully-support-the-boot-device/


Besides, if the HD has failed, those I have seen fail have not done so suddenly and completely and I have been able to recover information from them even when they were no longer able to boot... so, even in HD failure, there's a good chance you can at least recover your data from it...
 
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Kyle Miller

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Jul 11, 2013
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Sorry for the late reply, but I tried all of those but didn't change anything. I noticed that there was a red light on for boot_led so I pressed the memOK button and my hard drive now shows up as a boot option. It still doesn't boot up, but is able to run the windows repair, which after hours of loading, it says the problem can not be fixed.
My next thing to try is the windows disk but I'm not sure what that will do besides able to maybe reinstall, which I want to avoid.
 
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Chicano

Chicano

Judicious
Aug 29, 2011
5,071
29
35,490
Is that the Windows Repair without a disk?.. If so, try the Windows Repair with the disk. If it fails, try Safe Mode, and if that also fails, the next thing to try is the Reinstall...

So, try booting in Safe Mode... If you're able to logon, run the System Restore...

If still unable to logon, next up is:
a) A Repair Install,
b) A dual boot installation
c) Or a format-and-clean installation...

You want to avoid a), b) even less, so c) is your best option if you have enough disk space.

If you have at least 20 GB of free disk space, create a new partition... to create it, you can use a Live CD Partition Manager, a Hirens Boot CD, a Linux distro, or even a Windows disk but it would be the last thing to try because it has a very rudimentary partition tool. The Hiren's Boot CD would be my first choice because you can see the hard drive, partitions and files so you can do whatever is necessary to create a D partition and if you already have a D partition, move files from it to a new E partition, and install a new Windows on D. HBCD has a edition of Minitool Partition Wizard which makes creating new partitions a breeze.

If you want to you can also move your programs from C to D with Application Mover and once you have moved programs, personal files and have recovered your Windows Product Key, you can format drive C and Extend partition D to cover the free disk space. If you don't have sufficient Disk space or the Hard Drive fails to install on D, it will most likely still be able to be explored so you can recover personal files to a new hard drive and move programs with Application Mover... the only inconvenience with this program is that you can only move one program at a time but it still is faster than installing programs anew.
 
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Solution
K

Kyle Miller

Honorable
Jul 11, 2013
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10,530
Thank you so much Chicano. It sounds like a lot, so I just ordered a 840 Evo ssd, and upgrade I have been looking toward doing anyway. I don't have a cd drive in my computer because my old one was optical not sata but new motherboard only takes sata, and bootable USB wasn't working for me for hirens, saying it was missing boot(something).exe

With hirens, I will be able to transfer steam games and applications easy? Could you point me in the direction of a good tutorial of how to have two hard drives function properly?
I want to have windows on ssd and a few games I play regularly.

Again Chicano, thank you so much for your help.
 
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Chicano

Chicano

Judicious
Aug 29, 2011
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I want to clear-up a mistake I typed above.. I said c) was your best option... but meant to say b) for a clean installation on a second partition (or Hard Drive/SSD).

As for your IDE optical drive you can buy a SATA to IDE adapter to connect it to the motherboard like a SATA drive. Or you can also buy a PCI/PCIe IDE Controller.

As for nonbooting USB all modern motherboards have the option to boot USB, you may have to change a related setting. Also USB flash drives are recognized as USB Hard Drives, and you may need to make the USB flash drive the No 1 hard drive so it can boot. If Hirens Boot CD did start booting and the missing boot something.exe was the only issue, it may have been caused by the Bootable USB Maker... if it was the one suggested by the Hirens website that would be unlikely but still possible... you may want to try a different USB maker or repeat it with the same program because you may have missed something.. but if you get the SATA - IDE adapter the Hirens Bootable CD would be better suggested.

Running two hard drives or (SSD and HD) is not complicated, you only have to connect the main drive on the 1st SATA port and the second drive on second SATA port.. they are numbered so it should be easily done.

You can also move programs including game programs with the program I suggested before (Application Mover). If your game's history is saved in the games folers, they should move with the programs and if you saved it in your user profile folder, check if the folder properties has "Location" tab and just change the location path to your new user account and it should automatically move with all included files.


IDE to SATA Adapters
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100019418&IsNodeId=1&Description=ide%20to%20sata%20adapter&name=Hard%20Drive%20Adapters&Order=BESTMATCH&isdeptsrh=1

PCIe IDE Controllers
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007607&IsNodeId=1&Description=pcie%20ide%20controller&name=Controllers%20%2f%20RAID%20Cards&Order=BESTMATCH&isdeptsrh=1
 
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