Yikes! What the heck happened to my harddrive?

[CPA]

I have a WD 120G hard drive that I've had for less than a year. Over the weekend, my computer started to reboot and reboot and reboot. But the rebooting occurred before I could get into WinXP Pro. Basically the Bios started up, recognized the HD and then just as the WinXP load up screen (the one with the scrolling bar) came up, the system would reboot again.

I changed my Bios to startup using CDrom instead. This way I could try to do a repair using my WinXP Pro installation disk (full version). Only problem is that when I select repair install, I get an error message saying that I should run chkdsk /f. Additionally, the error seems to point to a problem in my NTFS.

I can't run chkdsk /f because I can't get to a prompt (any suggestions there) and I can't get into WinXP no matter what mode I use (Safe, Safe with prompt, etc.), it just keeps rebooting.

Anyone know what the problem is and is there a fix if I can get to a command prompt or is reformatting my only option, please don't tell me it is.

edit: I am using a Soyo Dragon+, TB1700, with 512meg Ram and a 350W Power Supply.

 

[newbiepcuser]

It sounds exactly what happen to my buddies WD, it just went bad. Can you mount it to another machine and recover the data.


Previous before all this, my friend's WD was making weird noises and then one day he couldn't boot into XP.

 

[CPA]

I tried mounting it as a slave drive in another computer. I get further along into the boot-up process, but then I get a blue screen with the error message. No automatic reboot, but can't do anything when I get to this screen. May need to boot up with a floppy and see if I can access a prompt, then go from there. Other websites are saying this is a WinXP issue with no apparent fix.

 

[LiLithTecH]

Do you have more than one MEMORY module installed?

If so, try removing them an replace them one by one.

 

[CPA]

Originally posted by: LiLithTecH
Do you have more than one MEMORY module installed?

If so, try removing them an replace them one by one.

2, but can you explain how memory modules would impact my rebooting problem. Are you saying the reboot could be caused by the memory modules, not the harddrive. I should mention, I installed another HD in last night and do not have the same issues. But I will try what you suggest.

 

[deadseasquirrel]

I'd boot from that other hard drive you mentioned and then run the WD diagnostic disk.... if you don't have that disk, you can run it from WD's website. It spit out the error for me for my WD, gave me a ref #, and walked me thru the RMA process. Very easily.

Did you have anything on that drive that wasn't backed up?

My WD behaved similarly. Wouldn't boot at all. And, once I did get into XP from a different HD, it wouldn't read it as a slave either. According to the Win XP installation, it showed that the partition was completely empty (when it actually had 60+gigs on there). I was finally able to save all my data and my RMA replacement just arrived today.

Had I known getting an RMA done would be so painless, I wouldn't have gone out and bought a new drive to hold me over (an "Advanced RMA" has WD send you a replacement before you send yours if you provide a CC #). Then again, I really like the idea of ghosting over my data weekly now to the new RMA drive. So now I won't go ape-poopy if/when this happens again.

deadseasquirrel

 

[CPA]

Originally posted by: deadseasquirrel
I'd boot from that other hard drive you mentioned and then run the WD diagnostic disk.... if you don't have that disk, you can run it from WD's website. It spit out the error for me for my WD, gave me a ref #, and walked me thru the RMA process. Very easily.

Did you have anything on that drive that wasn't backed up?

My WD behaved similarly. Wouldn't boot at all. And, once I did get into XP from a different HD, it wouldn't read it as a slave either. According to the Win XP installation, it showed that the partition was completely empty (when it actually had 60+gigs on there). I was finally able to save all my data and my RMA replacement just arrived today.

Had I known getting an RMA done would be so painless, I wouldn't have gone out and bought a new drive to hold me over (an "Advanced RMA" has WD send you a replacement before you send yours if you provide a CC #). Then again, I really like the idea of ghosting over my data weekly now to the new RMA drive. So now I won't go ape-poopy if/when this happens again.

deadseasquirrel

thanks, but one question: How can I run the diagnostic when I can't get into WinXP when the drive is hooked up either as master or slave?

 

[deadseasquirrel]

Originally posted by: CPA


thanks, but one question: How can I run the diagnostic when I can't get into WinXP when the drive is hooked up either as master or slave?

ah, hadn't read that part. sorry.

could it be the cable? maybe try a different ide cable and try hooking the (possibly) bad HDD to the IDE2 (or 3 or 4 if you have them), with it's own cable.

the fact that it wont go into windows with a bad slaved drive is way too odd. is SMART enabled?

 

[lucky9]

Boot to the WinXP CD and choose recovery console. At that prompt run chkdsk. Use the help that's available on disk. I'd recommend Windows XP Inside and Out.

 

[CPA]

Originally posted by: lucky9
Boot to the WinXP CD and choose recovery console. At that prompt run chkdsk. Use the help that's available on disk. I'd recommend Windows XP Inside and Out.

I tried this and I got the blue screen, no prompt. I will try again.

 

[LiLithTecH]

CPA wrote

but can you explain how memory modules would impact my rebooting problem.

Bad MEMORY will CORRUPT Hard drive Data very quickly and distructively.

It also could be a combination of both bad MEMORY and bad HARD DRIVE blocks.