PC won't boot, can't access hard disk

D

dg

Win XP SP3, SATA (Maxtor) hard disk - with 3 partitions

My PC crashed (first time for a couple of years!), and will not boot.
It did make a noise like it was accessing the floppy drive at the
time, although no disk was in this drive

On booting, it gets as far as the Windows splash screen, but then gets
the BSOD and mainly an "irql not less or equal" error, or occasionally
something like "trying to write to read only memory" error. And one or
two times, it stated a problem loading a driver from Symantec (I have
NIS 2009 installed)

I've tested memory and various other components and they are OK. One
disk check software found the HD and reported it OK, but the
manufacturers DOS diagnostic disk did not find the HD, so could not
check it

The PC won't start in any of the other start up options (Safe mode
etc) and the recovery console wont load as, when I boot from the
Windows CD, I need to load the SATA HD drivers from a floppy (Promise
378) but after the drivers are loaded and the load sequence ends, I
get the BSOD.

I took the HD out and connected it to a laptop via an external USB
adapter. The intention was to check the disk.

However, it spins up, but as soon as it is accessed by the laptop,
then it causes a BSOD on the laptop - again with the "irql not less or
equal" error.

So, it seems like a HD problem, but is there a cure?

Thanks

dg
 
P

Pegasus \(MVP\)

dg said:
Win XP SP3, SATA (Maxtor) hard disk - with 3 partitions

My PC crashed (first time for a couple of years!), and will not boot.
It did make a noise like it was accessing the floppy drive at the
time, although no disk was in this drive

On booting, it gets as far as the Windows splash screen, but then gets
the BSOD and mainly an "irql not less or equal" error, or occasionally
something like "trying to write to read only memory" error. And one or
two times, it stated a problem loading a driver from Symantec (I have
NIS 2009 installed)

I've tested memory and various other components and they are OK. One
disk check software found the HD and reported it OK, but the
manufacturers DOS diagnostic disk did not find the HD, so could not
check it

The PC won't start in any of the other start up options (Safe mode
etc) and the recovery console wont load as, when I boot from the
Windows CD, I need to load the SATA HD drivers from a floppy (Promise
378) but after the drivers are loaded and the load sequence ends, I
get the BSOD.

I took the HD out and connected it to a laptop via an external USB
adapter. The intention was to check the disk.

However, it spins up, but as soon as it is accessed by the laptop,
then it causes a BSOD on the laptop - again with the "irql not less or
equal" error.

So, it seems like a HD problem, but is there a cure?

Thanks

dg

If the manufacturer's diagnostic program cannot find the disk then it's
beyond salvation - replace it.
 
D

dg

If the manufacturer's diagnostic program cannot find the disk then it's
beyond salvation - replace it.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

It just seems odd that the HD will work up to a point, before
crashing. If it was defective then I would have thought that it would
not work at all.

I may check or try another copy of the manufacturers DOS disk to see
if I was not doing something correctly or if it was the wrong disk or
something

dg
 
R

R. McCarty

There are two distinct types of disk/volume issues. A physical defect
and a logical error ( Data ). You should boot to the Windows CD &
do a Chkdsk on the drive. The drive may not be defective, but have
logical errors that prevent Windows from starting. Sometimes a run of
Chkdsk will resolve the issues, other times a Repair on In-Place install
will be necessary.
*Chkdsk with a Repair or Fix qualifier can remove data in fixing issues.
Do NOT run Chkdsk /F (or) /R unless the volume is backed up.
 
C

Colon Terminus

dg said:
Win XP SP3, SATA (Maxtor) hard disk - with 3 partitions

My PC crashed (first time for a couple of years!), and will not boot.
It did make a noise like it was accessing the floppy drive at the
time, although no disk was in this drive

On booting, it gets as far as the Windows splash screen, but then gets
the BSOD and mainly an "irql not less or equal" error, or occasionally
something like "trying to write to read only memory" error. And one or
two times, it stated a problem loading a driver from Symantec (I have
NIS 2009 installed)

I've tested memory and various other components and they are OK. One
disk check software found the HD and reported it OK, but the
manufacturers DOS diagnostic disk did not find the HD, so could not
check it

The PC won't start in any of the other start up options (Safe mode
etc) and the recovery console wont load as, when I boot from the
Windows CD, I need to load the SATA HD drivers from a floppy (Promise
378) but after the drivers are loaded and the load sequence ends, I
get the BSOD.

I took the HD out and connected it to a laptop via an external USB
adapter. The intention was to check the disk.

However, it spins up, but as soon as it is accessed by the laptop,
then it causes a BSOD on the laptop - again with the "irql not less or
equal" error.

So, it seems like a HD problem, but is there a cure?

Thanks

dg


Download Memtest86 and run it for several hours.
You could easily be seeing a RAM problem.
 
P

Pegasus \(MVP\)

dg said:
It just seems odd that the HD will work up to a point, before
crashing. If it was defective then I would have thought that it would
not work at all.

I may check or try another copy of the manufacturers DOS disk to see
if I was not doing something correctly or if it was the wrong disk or
something

dg

If this was my PC, if the disk worked up to a certain point only and if the
manufacturer's diagnostic program failed to detect it then I would replace
it straight away. A new disk doesn't cost much and the risk of it failing
again after some "repair" is far too great.
 
D

dg

There are two distinct types of disk/volume issues. A physical defect
and a logical error ( Data ).  You should boot to the Windows CD &
do a Chkdsk on the drive. The drive may not be defective, but have
logical errors that prevent Windows from starting. Sometimes a run of
Chkdsk will resolve the issues, other times a Repair on In-Place install
will be necessary.
*Chkdsk with a Repair or Fix qualifier can remove data in fixing issues.
  Do NOT run Chkdsk /F (or) /R unless the volume is backed up.









- Show quoted text -

Thanks

I have managed to get to the recovery console, but chkdsk returns "The
volume appears to contain one or more unrecoverable problems"

Although all the important data is backed up, I would like to just
access the drive to check that there are no stray files.

But I will get a new HD

dg
 

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