Seagate 300 GB SATA go boom?

[scott_p]

I'm having a tough time as I think my hard drive is messing with me. I got the error "Windows unable to locate <windows root>system32hal.dll" or something along those lines. My computer no longer sees the dire. Booting from Windows XP Pro disc doesn't help as both Repair and install options fail since it sees no drive connected to the computer.

The motherboard is an A7N8X-DX and the drive has been installed and operating for about six months now. I just built a machine for the folks and I can get it to see the drive, but an I/O Device Error keeps me from seeing the data. That computer has a fresh install of XP Pro, an Asus K8V-MX motherboard and XP installed on a PATA drive.

Is there something I'm missing? The new computer picks up 2 of the 3 partitions, but doesn't let me access and folders on that drive. The data is very important, so I'm trying to avoid anything that requires a format.

The drive is a Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 and the model is ST3300831AS

 

[Bluefinger]

I had a similar problem with a Western Digital hdd which was so faulty, it was an artform. The only way i could get it to work was to do a quick format, and even then, i had problem installing things onto it, not to mention poor performance. If i did a full format, it would take way too long to do so (compared to the Seagate 300GB 7200.9, WD hdd was 250GB SATA2 ), and then it would always come up with a BSOD. I reckon the hdd has a lot of bas sectors on it, so it might not be working because the BIOS cannot bring up the files necessary to boot up the OS. Or, go into BIOS and check whether the Plug and Play OS setting is enabled, because that could help as well... if not, then HDD is faulty and would require a replacement.

 

[scott_p]

I have the drive down to a local computer shop now. They are attempting to recover the data on the drive. I went down to Fry's and bought another drive of the same model. Once I get my current one back from Seagate for warranty, I'm going RAID 1.

I just hope they can get the important data off teh drive. The guy sounded somewhat hopeful.