SMART imminent hard drive failure error message

[Celkiar04]

I have a computer where it receives an error message upon startup from the
SMART monitoring predicting that the primary master may have imminent failure
and to please back up all data. Then it states to press F1 to continue or
DELETE to enter setup. If you press F1 it just reloads the same page and
error message. Press DELETE and you go into the BIOS. No where are you
given an option nor will the computer boot normally into windows. Also
unable to boot into Safe Mode. I went into the BIOS to disable the SMART
monitoring in case that was preventing the computer from booting into
Windows. Lo and behold, SMART is already disabled. I enabled it and then
rebooted. Same message, same problem, unable to boot into Windows. Went
into BIOS and disabled SMART, no change upon reboot.

The computer seems to be in this error loop with no option to boot into
Windows XP. The user has not backed up any files since March 2007. We need
to access the hard drive in order to do a back up.

This all happened after the user did Windows updates and then the computer
automatically shut down for a reboot.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to boot the computer into windows?
The Windows XP disks that the computer came with have been misplaced but are
being searched for as I type this. Other than boot from disk, which may not
work if its something with the hard drive that is preventing Windows from
loading, how can I launch Windows XP?

Also can I restore to a previous restore point from the BIOS? Or is there
some way to fix the hard drive failure error message we keep getting?

Thanks for any help?

 

[Grand_Poobah]

Have you tried putting the drive into another computer as a secondary
drive? You should be able to recover the savable information this way
(providing the SMART doesn't stop you).

GP

--->

 

[Celkiar04]

At this time I don't have access to a spare computer to do so (because of the
holidays). We really need access to that data. Is there anything else I can
do in the meantime?

Thanks for your help!

 

[Celkiar04]

I found the Windows XP cd. At this time I don't have a boot disk for it. I
went into the Recovery Console to look at the bootfile. When I tried to look
at the boot list (Bootcfg /list) is says there are none. When I attempted to
rebuild (bootcfg /rebuild) I got an error message and then it failed. Help!

 

[Grand_Poobah]

The Windows XP CD should be bootable. Set your BIOS to make the CD the
first boot device and put it in the drive. Let the machine boot and
choose your options.

GP

--->

 

[Gerry]

I think you can turn off SMART in the BIOS. You will most likely need to
re-enable it in the BIOS when you install a new drive.


--



Hope this helps.

Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Grand_Poobah]

I have seen two places to turn it off: 1) in the BIOS, as you say
Gerry, and, 2) using the manufacturer's utility that sometimes comes
with the drive. Western Digital and Maxtor come to mind. Both have
SMART capability.

GP

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