vliktor
join:2005-07-27
Philippines
 ·SmartBro
edit:
August 8th, @04:22AM
| [hard drive] Dead laptop hard drive?
I REALLY REALLY think the laptop's hard drive has gone into retirement, but read on and see if you have other opinions:
I was *trying* to fix a laptop of a relative, a Sony VAIO PCG-FX33S/BP (Celeron 900 mhz, 128 MB pc-100 sodimm ram, 20 gb hard drive). The laptop is from Japan and had two partitions, XP Home in English and XP Home in Japanese.
It had been experiencing KERNEL_STACK_INPAGE errors. I found out that the laptop has been horrifyingly using XP Home Edition *without* *ANY* Service Packs (and connected to the internet via DSL!!!). So I figured a reinstall was in order (finding the drivers for a Japanese laptop using Google Translate was fun!). As I was reinstalling by booting from CD and reinstalling, the setup would quit right after quick format with NTFS, because it says the partition/hard drive is corrupted or defective! I tried to recreate the partitions again, install again, multiple times... it'd either quit on formatting to NTFS, or on the actual installation process, it'd hang and you'd see no hard disk activity or cd-rom activity (stuck on 39 minutes remaining). You'd also hear some audible clicks inside the laptop during the process (!). I noticed that the clicks take place right around the time when the install stops.
After several install/recreate partition cycles, the XP boot cd complained that it couldn't find a hard drive (!). I checked into BIOS, and voila, the hard drive is gone. Restarting didn't help, so I did a hard reboot (remove AC power), and reconnected. Hard drive is now on BIOS, but still same problem when reinstalling/formatting to NTFS. After several restarts, the hard drive disappears from BIOS again. One last resort? I used the ubuntu boot cd to run the damn thing through live cd.. it quit (maybe because of a paltry 128 MB of RAM?).
So do you think the hard drive is really a goner? |
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ChiTang
Premium,MVM
join:2002-08-23
Alhambra, CA
| It does seems like the HD is having issue but without 100% certain, it could be HD or MOBO or RAM. Bad RAM usually give you BSOD during install. Use memtest86 to check memory. Put HD in enclosure and check with other system to find out for sure.
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I used to be indecisive, now I am not sure. |
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vliktor
join:2005-07-27
Philippines
·SmartBro
| That's the thing; I didn't get any BSOD's during installation. It only would either quit because it says the hard drive/partition is corrupted, or it'd just get stuck there in installing XP for like 10 minutes (and still stuck at saying 39 minutes remaining).
Ah, and i still need to figure out how to open the laptop..:) |
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ChiTang
Premium,MVM
join:2002-08-23
Alhambra, CA
| reply to vliktor
Here is from Microsoft: »support.microsoft.com/kb/315266/en-us
If you can't take out the old HD to test, you can't replace it even if the HD is determined to be bad.
I try to locate a manual, but the support in sony.com says the support is in sony's japanese website. I went there but I couldn't make a darn word out of it, sorry.
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I used to be indecisive, now I am not sure. |
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vliktor
join:2005-07-27
Philippines
·SmartBro
| Yeah, that's the first thing I looked into regarding the kernel errors. Since the accursed laptop didn't any service packs, I figured to just nuke and pave. I figured I could have just run a chkdsk instead..  too late for that I guess.
I did find the ethernet, and video drivers from the Sony Japan website (with Google Translate), but the audio was a pain to find; it wouldn't even tell me what audio chipset the damn laptop had!
I guess I'll have to look for help from a shop who sells old laptop hard drives for assistance. 
Thanks for the help. |
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