My hard drive has been acting up lately (a hitachi 60 GB ATA 4200 rpm) in a Dell Laptop, I can't boot past the loading screen - I 've already done 3 windows repair reinstallations, and the third time was done 20 min ago from typing this thread...
I've found a component tester (pressing Fn button when booting), and when the Short DST test comes up, it says fail......what does that mean?
Is there any way I can fix this drive by myself...some utlity maybe...chdsk...?
Run erd from Winternals or something like that. Usually in this case, you may want to attain a new drive, plus an external 2.5 enclosure to repair the other. I would call Dell\India for any warranty the drive may have.
Do you still have the hidden reinstall partition on your hard disk? If so, you could reinstall the OS back to the original Dell configuration. Sure, you'll loose all your data, but at least you'll have a working computer. It doesn't sound like a failing hard drirve. Sounds more like a bad OS install.
I probably dont - I low-level formatted the drive using a Maxtor utility around a month or two ago - it was the only way I thought I could get rid of the lag/slowness on my laptop, since it has been troubling me almost for 3 months.
IF a Short DST fails, does that mean the HD is a goner, or can DST test more than HD health?
I would say your drive is on the way down the pooper. I happen to have a copy of the Winternal's from a friend of mine, but you may be able to torrent the now Microsoft product. If you formated the disk the Dell hidden partition gone. You'll need to get a new drive and OS, but u would not recommend writing to your disk anymore. Buy a new drive and an external enclosure to rebuild the partition and save your data.
forgive me, but what's an external enclosure?
-haven't had much experience with hard drives
You say that it's finished, but I'm wondering if like joefriday said, it might be some other problem......Are the chances that it's another problem great?
Check the out on the web here is an example. Basically they are a external box that work through your USB interface rather than inside your Laptop. Same thing as external hard drives. You can grab a notebook drive just as easy. Check out newegg.com for notebook hard drives.
My 4200rpm drive ran 54-55c all the time. The new 7200 lowered the temp to 45-47.
I also increased the ram from 512 to 1024, which may have helped cut down the disk mem swaping.
But I keep my laptop cooling clean. I blow out the dust on a montly basis. I have even torn my apart and re-apply the thermal Paste to the cpu, switched over to AS5, now the fan run on low 95% of the time.
My hard drive has been acting up lately (a hitachi 60 GB ATA 4200 rpm) in a Dell Laptop, I can't boot past the loading screen - I 've already done 3 windows repair reinstallations, and the third time was done 20 min ago from typing this thread...
I've found a component tester (pressing Fn button when booting), and when the Short DST test comes up, it says fail......what does that mean?
Is there any way I can fix this drive by myself...some utlity maybe...chdsk...?
If you fail the DST test your hard drive is bad or will be.... repalce it.
If it was under warranty a DST failure is enough for an automatic replacement even if you ahve NO other issues, it indicates immenent hard drive failure.
Somehow, I've had this DST failure for over 4 months, and it hasn't broken down entirely, but I'm not too happy about repair-reinstalling XP like almost every day just to boot XP and work on it.
to jesterx, i was talking about software damage, (ie. data corruption).
What are the chances of Spinrite "healing" my Hard Drive?
-want to know before getting it...
Okay, so...no more Dell partition. That's okay. If you have the ability to run repair installs, you must have a windows XP cd handy. How 'bout just a regular good ol' reformat/install using the XP CD instead of a repair install? You could at least see if it works.
You blow out the dust through the intakes and exhaust vents. Will warn you, if it's never been done it can be nasty, do it outside. And lint actually stickes to the fan and can block the cooling fins on the heat sink. Some times the only way to clean it is take it apart so you can scrape the packed stuff off.
Remember, every time you start you notebook up the closer it is to failing all together. BACK OFF ALL DATA WHILE YOU HAVE ACCESS.
At least you are geting a warning, alot of time you do not.
