Vista does not start: "Disk Read Error" message

[thewhip]

I have a Gateway laptop with Windows Vista Home pre-installed. It worked
fine until the other day. Now I turn the computer on, see the start-up
screen, and then see a "Disk read error occurred Press Ctrl + Alt + Del to
restart". I tried the Vista CD with the same result. If it were solely a
hard drive issue, shouldn't I be able to boot up from CD?

The start-up screen identifies the hard drive and the system time is correct
(as seen though the Bios menu). Any ideas?

 

[Kerry Brown]

Is the DVD drive set as the boot drive in the BIOS? Could you boot from the
Vista DVD previously?

 

[Mike Hall - MVP]

The Windows DVD will not boot unless the DVD drive is first in the boot
order. Go into BIOS and change the order or look at the splash screen and
see if there is an option to temporarily change the boot order.

Something that can sometimes work is to remove the HDD and reseat it. While
you are doing this, make a note of the make of HDD and download and run the
HDD tests from the manufacturer web site.

PLEASE NOTE that if the HDD operation was noisy before failure, DO NOT DO
ANYTHING WITH IT UNTIL YOU ARE READY TO RUN A FILE RECOVERY PROCEDURE ON IT.

You might also want to contact the vendor re the HDD warranty.

The reason for the drive still showing up is because the electronics
responsible for telling the computer 'here I am' are still working but the
mechanics of the drive are not.

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

The same error message probably means it's not trying to boot from the
optical drive. You may need to change the boot order. I'd download a drive
diagnostic and use it to check the state of the drive.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[thewhip]

Thanks for the reply, Kerry. I did not try to boot from the Vista DVD
previously. I did change the boot order to doot from the CD drive, but I
receive the same "Disk read error".

 

[thewhip]

Thank Mike. I had tried changing the boot order from the file screen without
any change in error message (same Dike read error). I will try reseating the
hard drive.

 

[thewhip]

Thank you for the reply, Rick. I would have trouble downloading a diagnostic
as I can not get past the error screen... Unless I used another computer.
But then I would be unsure how to access the corrupted laptop drive from
there.

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

Yes, you'd have to do it from another computer. How you would access the
laptop would depend on the type of disk, either bootable CD or floppy. Doing
so does not require the hard drive on the laptop, that's the whole point.
You boot the laptop from the disk and run the drive checks from there.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com