I recently replaced the hard drive on my client's Dell Inspiron 8600 with a Samsung HM160HC hard drive. Windows XP and all security and application software was installed with all appropriate updates. Application software includes MS Office 2003, iTunes, Picasa - nothing exotic. The computer has been running perfectly for about two weeks. Recently, my client played a movie, turned off the computer for the night and the next morning could not get it to boot. Only sees the BIOS, then a black screen and flashing white underscore symbol. Can go into BIOS setup. Cannot boot into safe mode.
What might have occurred? Did the master boot record get obliterated? What needs to be done to return the computer to normal operating mode?
Thanks in advance for your assitance!
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1. Check the harddisk power cable and datacable. Remove it and insert again in harddisk.
2. Remove the RAM clean it and put again.
3. Then go to bios, check the boot device configuration. Check whether ur hardinsk detect or not.
4. If it detect ur hardisk, check its boot order, make hardisk first boot device.
After all this boot ur system again. If it dont work then format ur operating system and reinstall it.
My client delivered the computer to me this morning. I checked the BIOS and it does show a 137GB drive as the primary drive. I then booted from the Windows DVD and went into recovery mode to investigate the Master Boot Record status. During entry to recovery mode, it did ask which Windows installation - the only one was selected - C:\Windows and the adminstrator password was entered OK. When i invoked FIXMBR, I received a messge indicating that the master boot record was invalid or unavailable (or words to that effect). I was warned that recreating the MBR could mess up the partition, but went ahead with the process. When I rebooted the computer, I received the same result as earlier - the BIOS screen shows, then I see a rapidly flashing white underscore symbol in the upper-left corner of the screen.
I don't have time now to look into additional alternatives that have been suggested, but want to share the latest information to see if anyone has additional thoughts about resolution in view of what I have done. Thanks!!
This evening I tried a Windows repair installation. It proceeded normally, first seeing the existing installation on the C: drive, then going through the normal first phase copying files, etc. As soon as it got to the first reboot, the process stopped. I could see the BiIOS screen on the reboot and then the rapidly flashing white cursor on the black screen, exactly the same symptom I started with. For some odd reason, the computer cannot get from the BIOS to a Windows boot screen. Any ideas why this is occurring?
I tried the Fixboot suggestion and still had the same problem - rapidly flashing white cursor following the BIOS screen. I then downloaded the Ulitmate Boot CD and ran the Samsung HDDIAG program. The new HM160HC drive passed all tests. I did not do a detailed hard drive scan because the problem is more basic than that.
So, at this point, the Windows Repair ran through to the point of rebooting and then encountered the flashing white cursor issue, the fixmbr and fixboot suggestions did not work and the hard drive test passed. I also removed one of the memory modules to see if that would make a difference and it did not. Fundamentally, we have an impasse when booting.
I would appreciated ideas about next steps. Thanks in advance for taking this to the next level!
You've got the UBCD.
Use TestDisk under Partition Tools.
See http://www.cgsecurity.org/
and look at the section
Use it to check for Partition Tables and check if they are bootable. Don't alter anything. Report back.
http://www.bootdisk.com/bo
I tried the quick boot suggestion by burning the files to a CD using the normal Vista utility. I then tried to boot my troublesome laptop from it and heard the CD drive cranking, but still got the rapidly flashing white cursor in the upper left corner of the screen.
Next, I ran the test partition utility from the Ultimate Boot CD. This is what I transcribed from each of the screens:
Disk 80-137 GB/127Gib CHS 16709 25563
The hard disk seem to be greater than 137GB
Support for 48 bit logical block addressing (LBA) is needed to access hard disks larger than 137GB
Continue the HD is really 137GB only
Quit The HD is bigger . . .
I chose continue, even though the drive is 160GB (Samsung HM160HC).
Next screen:
1 *HPFS NTFS 0 1 1 19457 8063 Sectors 312581745
* = primary bootable
Next screen:
The hard disk (137GB/126GiB)) seems too small! (<160GB/149GiB)
Check the hard disk size : HD jumper settings, BIOS . .
Next screen:
The following partition cannot be recovered
D HPFS-NTFS Start 0 1 1 19457 End 00 65 Sectors 312581745
Next screen:
Disk 80-137GB CHS 16709 255 63
Structure: OK
So, what does all this suggest? I am ready to try the next steps and am truly perplexed that a new hard drive with a totally fresh installation of all software is not booting after only two weeks of use. Is this a problem with the BIOS or motherboard?
Thanks for your continuing assistance!!
I happen to have the old hard drive, so reinstalled it in the Inspiron 8600 laptop and it booted just fine, so we do not have a BIOS or motherboard problem. Additionally, I put the new hard drive (Samsung HM160HC) into an external case and found that I could read all the data on the drive with no problems. So, it appears that I need to do some work to make the new drive bootable again. I do wonder how that ability was lost.
So the BIOS thinks it's 137 Gb when it's actually 160 Gb.
This is what TestDisk is complaining about. The BIOS is not reading it's capacity correctly.
--------------------------
Disk 80-137 GB/127Gib CHS 16709 25563
The hard disk seem to be greater than 137GB
Support for 48 bit logical block addressing (LBA) is needed to access hard disks larger than 137GB
--------------------------
The laptop has no problem with your smaller disk. It's under the 137 mark. Check your BIOS and see if there's an option to enable LBA.
You need to update your bios found here:
http://support.dell.com/su
under the bios section download and run the exe it will tell you what to do from there.
>> What do you think about my partitioning suggestion. I can do that by putting the drive into an external case to do the partitioning using another computer.
If you do that don't exceed 130 Gb and don't worry about the rest. That's going to wipe what's there though.
What I can't understand is why the BIOS sees it as 137 Gb. Its modern enough to support LBA. There's no jumpers on the Samsung to put it into legacy mode. If you've got another laptop drop it in there and see what that BIOS recognizes it as.
actually upon further reading you might actually have something there its not guaranteed but you may be able to pull it off. You might have to recreate the partition and reinstall because some of the data has been written over the 137 gb sector of the drive but you could always give it a shot in the dark and resize it first.
The booting issue was definitely caused by the lack of LBA support for drives larger than 137GB. I repartitioned the new hard drive (130GB and 30GB partitions), using the Paragon Hard Disk Utility. During the repartitioning process, the program moved data, so I know that data was in the area beyond the 137GB area. Interestingly, after the repartitioning when I rebooted the computer it resumed from hibernation, looked very promising with desktop screen, etc, then presented a blue screen with stop code indicating that the disk image was bad. I then tried a Windows repair and when I got to the screen that lists that partitions, the C: partition was listed as "unknown" and I did not have a repair option, only fresh installation. So, the repartitioning process did not preserve the original installation. I have since reinstalled Windows in the 130GB partition and computer is working fine. Moral of the story - always confirm that the BIOS can support drives larger than 137GB or adjust the primary partition accordingly. Thanks very much to an excellent team of experts who diligently worked on helping me resolve this problem!
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by: dbruntonPosted on 2009-03-24 at 20:04:54ID: 23975751
Does the hard disk show in the BIOS?
If it doesn't then you need to check power cable to hard disk, cable from motherboard to hard disk and see whether those are connected.
If it does then there could be lots of problems.
Get the UBCD http://www.ultimatebootcd.
Download links are the icons at the top of the page above Overview. Browse the page and see what utils are there for you. Check the memory and hard disk utils especially.
Test the hard disk with the correct manufacturer's util for your hard disk. Do the long test. That will see if your hard disk is OK.
If it isn't then you'll need a new disk.
If it is then there's other options to get it back working. But start with the above.