PRoblem with booting

[mothekiller]

Hello

i got a kind of big problem
my pc doesen't start
when i start the pc i get : boot failiure
i don't now what to do
i tryed everything
the first this i did : i openend the pc and looked for some dead wire's or things like that
but everything is oke
i think its my HDD
when i put the windows xp install disk is says setup cannot acces to the HDD
my HDD i fine i think the wire's are oke
and the only thing i now of my HDD is that it is a Cable select HDD...? and its 40GB

so hope you guys can help me

______________________________

PC Specs
Intel Pentium 4 1.8 GHZ
mother board ...?
512 MB RAM
40 GB HDD
and its a HP E-PC 42

 

[elel]

Is there anything that you really need on that HDD?

 

[mothekiller]

Is there anything that you really need on that HDD?

no there is nothing i need .... do i need to replace the HDD

 

[elel]

Well, let us catalog what might cause a problem like this. Bad motherboard, bad cable, bad power cable, bad hard drive. The easiest to check would be the power and data cables, at least if you have extras. You said that you thought the hard drive was good. Does that mean that you heard it spinning? In that case, the power cable is probably not the problem. Are there any abnormal noises that you hear?

 

[mothekiller]

Well, let us catalog what might cause a problem like this. Bad motherboard, bad cable, bad power cable, bad hard drive. The easiest to check would be the power and data cables, at least if you have extras. You said that you thought the hard drive was good. Does that mean that you heard it spinning? In that case, the power cable is probably not the problem. Are there any abnormal noises that you hear?

nope i hear nothing special out that pc just normal noise the only thing i hear is the FAN

 

[elel]

If you open it up and take the hard drive out while leaving it attached (make sure to touch the metal case before touching any parts) and then turn the computer on, can you hear the drive itself spinning and clicking?

 

[mothekiller]

If you open it up and take the hard drive out while leaving it attached (make sure to touch the metal case before touching any parts) and then turn the computer on, can you hear the drive itself spinning and clicking?

the HDD is working well i hear a spinning noise from te HDD and clicking noise to

 

[elel]

Is the clicking constant, like in a rhythm? Like click...click...click...click, without stopping? If so, your hard drive is probably dead. Just get a new one.

 

[pat]

do you have a floppy drive? forgotten floppy disk can cause if floppy is set as first boot device.

 

[elel]

:lol:
I almost forgot about that. (entirely, I mean)

 

[mothekiller]

lol i dont got a floppy drive
but i can set my boot orden so first the cd drive then floppy then hdd and then lan
the 2nd selection is the same but then hdd and lan switched

 

[mothekiller]

the hdd is fine i heat 2 times somtimes 2 and then i hear it spinning

 

[mothekiller]

heel there i ama agian
i got an 500 GB hdd can i put it on my pc
and i dont got any power suply i got an adapter for my pc so

 

[elel]

um, what?

 

[mothekiller]

hello got a other problem Cannot open Theme Settings, Display Settings, Screen Saver

when i click it i got nothing
i got windows Vista Home Premium SP1 i hapenend after i instaled vista Glazz for themes

 

[mothekiller]

hello i the pc that i have the pentuim 4 has this problem
when i boot it will say boot failiure insert prober boot device or insert boot bedia pres any key when ready

i really need to fix this problem so please help me

 

[elel]

Is this the same old drive as in the original post? Or are we dealing with something else now?

 

[mothekiller]

Is this the same old drive as in the original post? Or are we dealing with something else now?

no its the same problem wiht the same drive i replaced the hdd wiht a other one i got the same problem so the hdd is not the problem
what else could it be'mother board...?
i can't replace the mainboard cuz this pc is as old as me
so yeah... what now
but i really want slove this problem

 

[elel]

Did it work for awhile with the new drive? I'm guessing it did. Do you have a cd in any of the cd drives, or a floppy in the floppy drive? If so, try removing it and re-booting.

 

[mothekiller]

Did it work for awhile with the new drive? I'm guessing it did. Do you have a cd in any of the cd drives, or a floppy in the floppy drive? If so, try removing it and re-booting.

listen i don't got a floppy drive
it dident work with the new hdd just the same problem

 

[elel]

This problem can also be caused by a cd in the cd drive. This can be solved by taking the cd out, and/or switching the HDD to the first slot in the boot order sequence. Also, I saw on another thread that someone was having a somewhat similar problem with win 7, as in re-install, works, re-boot, doesn't. They solved it by disabling automatic updates in windows.

 

[mothekiller]

DANM
there isn't a cd in the drive I CAN't INSTALL WINDOWS CUZ MY INSTALL CD DOESN'T COME SOMTHING IT CANNOT ACCES TO THE HDD SO..................................................

 

[elel]

OK, I'll pm a couple of other people to look at this thread and see if they have ideas. It could be something simple which I don't know about.

 

[505090]

did anything happen the the computer? power surge, drop it, virus, previous problems,...

1. reset bios to fail-safe defaults, if you can't find it take the battery out and smoke a cigarette then put it back, it'll do the same thing

2. set first boot device to cd, second to HDD, rest doesn't matter assuming only one hdd installed

3. reboot

4. does the hdd show up in the bios???

5.a. if yes put your win disc in and off you go
b. if no try i. different drive
ii. different cable
iii. different port on mb

6. report back what happens

 

[elel]

Thanks for bailing me out, man. Good advice.