Hi everyone, seems ive done something rather stupid. I had Windows 7 working perfectly fine until i used the loader, I used the Hazar 1.6 version and as it opened i just clicked "install/remove Loader" after this the computer restarted and now i can no longer get windows 7 to start. I have tried booting from the windows 7 disc but it just loops after lading files and tries to start windows again with no luck, i went through the troubleshooting on here regarding pressing "r" on start up and changed to boot without loader, but as it tries to recover windows i just get stuck with a black page and a Arrow. Seems i have done something to my MBR but i dont seem to be able to fix it as i cant get the computer to boot from cd/dvd Anyone got any ideas? Thanks Gavin
Wow, that is odd dude. I don't think the loaders can make your computer not boot from the CD/DVD drive. That sounds like another issue like maybe a hardware issue. Have you tried loading off of another source of the win7 install like another install disk or a flash drive to see if that helps? If you have at least a 4 GB flash drive you should try to install win7 from there. I am thinking maybe your CD/DVD drive is having issues. Other then that I really don't know. As far as I do know the loader only affects boot order after the HDD is selected to boot, not before when the CD drive loads. Did you change any bios related settings for your CD/DVD drive? That might be the problem too.
Will try that first just downloading now, will then give the pen drive ago, after i installed windows 7 lastnight i downloaded the new biosflash update which i was able to run a few moments ago. This didnt resolve anything and still cant get windows to load up. Will let you know how linux goes
ok so i got a bit further, sorry for the long reply kinda got stuck watching final lost lol. I installed ubuntu onto a usb drive, installer works fine but the disk utility shows "DISK FAILURE IMMINENT" 1365 bad secotrs this doesnt seem to be stopping me to carry on but obviously seems like it will be a big issue
Use a utility to check the drives SMART status. (Preferably the manufacturers tool.) If there is a real defect to the drive, this will tell you all about it.
That actually is not always true dude. I had an old WDC HDD that had great reports from S.M.A.R.T but according to serface scans it had bad sectors as well. Western Digital told me that you could still be having a HDD dye even though it says good with the SMART detection. I just wanted to point that out.
Pretty much nailin a hard drive problem is very difficult most of the time you just have to nail down everything that could cause the problem which will eventually lead back to the Hard drive. Personally I haven't had any hard drives fail "yet" but most of the time a SMART scan will detect a problem but even still your probably going to have to go through a couple OS installs to make it all happen sadly enough.
I agree with you Smorgan too. In my own personal experience I was having computer lock ups on both XP and win7 and I did not know what was going on. I tried everything from bios upgrades to changing drivers/hardware but nothing helped. I finally used a handy tool called WD Data Lifeguard(CD Boot edition) and let it run a 4 hour extended surface test and it gave me an error code(It gives everyone a certain code). From there all I had to do was google that code and it took me to a WD site that said the certain code means replace drive. Luckily for me my drive was still under warranty so I got a new one for free. The point though is you never know for sure but there are tools that can really help ppl out
thanks for all the help everyone, after going through all the ubuntu stuff, that enabled me to wipe everything and put a fresh install on, after this was all completed and up and running. I can now run the windows 7 disc again and currently going through that now. With regards to the hard drive, yeah disk utility was showing the sata hdd with the bad sectors, i will give the regen a pop and see how that turns out, everything obviously seems to be working fine, ill monitor it over the next few days or soo. see if anything arises, Big thanks to Sam and Calistoga and anyone else who added into the topic. First day on the forum and very please to say it was well worth it, will be sticking around to hopefully help others and join in on the banter. Thanks again Gavin
Thats why i said 'preferably the manufacturers tool'. For one thing these specially made tools know how to interpret the collected SMART data right, (which cannot be said of all tools out there), and for another they do not merely read out the existing statistics, but actually test the drives circuits, mechanic and platter surfaces to see if there is more than might be derived from the statistic alone. Maybe i should have been more clear on that. (But even so if you run say Everest, and it shows a massive reallocation count, then you can be pretty sure that your drive is shot to hell by that alone.)
I know dude. All I wanted to point out was that in some scenarios you could have a bad HDD but your diag tools says "Smart Level Good". Thats all.
Yes, absolutely. After all the data collected during normal operation is not comparable to what an extensive entire-disk test with the manufacturers tool might reveal. Still if SMART says "Hey look, i have logged an insane amount of sector reallocations" even before you did any tests then you know it is time to do something.
What i would do in his situation is this: • Boot the manufacturers tool and run the Short Test. This will read out the SMART data collected to date and do some basic tests like spindle motor, head-array and reading the first 5k sectors, etc. • If the Short Test says 'All is well' i would run the Extended Test just to see if that reveals more. • If the Short Test already says 'Drive on the Fritz', i would see to it that i get as much of the data off as still possible and then (in case the corrupted parts are indispensable) have Spinrite trying to recover the rest. After that the drive may take up its new job as a paperweight.