Laptop won't boot, keeps running system repair--help?

[Anne.B]

Hi there. Alright, so yesterday both my laptop, an hp Pavillion dv6700, and my mom's, an hp G60, decided it'd be cool to stop working. (What're the chances of that?) My mom's computer--the one I'm on currently--kept shutting off or giving us a BSOD and all that, so I called hp tech support and the technician told me to run a BIOS hard disk self test. The test failed and they ordered a new harddrive and installation disk for us.

Now, the warranty on my laptop ran out so I couldn't continue talking to the tech person about it but I ran the same hard disk test. I got "Test Status: #10009 -- Replace Hard Disk."


Here's what's been happening with my computer:

Every time I start it up it first has the hp welcome screen thing, then it'll either go straight into startup repair or give me the "Windows Error Recovery" screen, which gives me the option of "Launch Startup Repair (recommended)" or "Start Windows Normally." And then launch startup repair anyway.

So I'm stuck at Startup Repair and it searches for problems for a few minutes before stopping and notifying me that "Startup Repair cannot repair this computer automatically. Sending more information can help Microsoft create solutions." (Then there are problem details, but I don't know if they're important or not. If they are I can post them in here--they're the same each time.) Then the only option I'm given is Finish (which will shut off my computer), Cancel (which'll restart it), or view advanced options (which will ask me for a password that doesn't exist because we never set one up).

Anyway, that test result saying "Replace Hard Disk" sounds...bad. Mostly because I haven't backed up a lot of my files. I saved about half of them a few days ago, but I figured, "Hey, I'll back up the rest tomorrow. It's not like my computer's going to crash before the week is over."

Other notes:
I don't have the Vista cd, though I think hp is sending it for my mom's computer
I can't start Windows in safe mode, either, there's only ever the two options


I don't know what else to do. It seems like my hard drive needs to be replaced, but is there a possibility it could be something else? A new hard drive would cost a lot of money and I'm trying to save up so I can have a shot of paying for school next sem.

But if it is my hard drive and there's no way around replacing it, is there a way to recover my data? I had a lot of important personal files that I forgot to back up and I'm now kicking myself for it. Help, please?

[Gurra]

If you are getting a BSOD your disk is still good enough to be read, but the BIOS status message indicates it is about to expire so I wouldn't advise resurrecting it.
Replace the built in hard disk with a new one and reinstall Vista.
Search ebay for a "SATA USB 2.5" hard disk enclosure" or buy one in a local shop. They are very cheap.
Stick your old hard drive in this enclosure and read your data from it.
If you are having problems reading from it, start a command prompt and run a chkdsk /f /r on it, then try again.
Good luck
/Gurra

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anne.B

Hi there. Alright, so yesterday both my laptop, an hp Pavillion dv6700, and my mom's, an hp G60, decided it'd be cool to stop working. (What're the chances of that?) My mom's computer--the one I'm on currently--kept shutting off or giving us a BSOD and all that, so I called hp tech support and the technician told me to run a BIOS hard disk self test. The test failed and they ordered a new harddrive and installation disk for us.

Now, the warranty on my laptop ran out so I couldn't continue talking to the tech person about it but I ran the same hard disk test. I got "Test Status: #10009 -- Replace Hard Disk."


Here's what's been happening with my computer:

Every time I start it up it first has the hp welcome screen thing, then it'll either go straight into startup repair or give me the "Windows Error Recovery" screen, which gives me the option of "Launch Startup Repair (recommended)" or "Start Windows Normally." And then launch startup repair anyway.

So I'm stuck at Startup Repair and it searches for problems for a few minutes before stopping and notifying me that "Startup Repair cannot repair this computer automatically. Sending more information can help Microsoft create solutions." (Then there are problem details, but I don't know if they're important or not. If they are I can post them in here--they're the same each time.) Then the only option I'm given is Finish (which will shut off my computer), Cancel (which'll restart it), or view advanced options (which will ask me for a password that doesn't exist because we never set one up).

Anyway, that test result saying "Replace Hard Disk" sounds...bad. Mostly because I haven't backed up a lot of my files. I saved about half of them a few days ago, but I figured, "Hey, I'll back up the rest tomorrow. It's not like my computer's going to crash before the week is over."

Other notes:
I don't have the Vista cd, though I think hp is sending it for my mom's computer
I can't start Windows in safe mode, either, there's only ever the two options


I don't know what else to do. It seems like my hard drive needs to be replaced, but is there a possibility it could be something else? A new hard drive would cost a lot of money and I'm trying to save up so I can have a shot of paying for school next sem.

But if it is my hard drive and there's no way around replacing it, is there a way to recover my data? I had a lot of important personal files that I forgot to back up and I'm now kicking myself for it. Help, please?