Disk Error/Boot Failure????????

greystreeks

I have an Advent 6412 Laptop. I was watching a dvd on it yesterday and when I went to shut it down an error message appeared. Disk failure! I pressed return twice and received another message saying Boot Failure. Im currently running XP Pro as my OS. I turned my machine off and tried to repair my OS with the disk and I am reluctant to reinstall my OS as I will loose alot of data. Can anyone Help please!!!:eek:

Sleipnir

what happens when you boot up now?
are you sure that when it said "disk error" it wasn't just referring to the DVD disk?

greystreeks

I removed the DVD and tried to boot from scratch and I still received the message.

Sleipnir

now I know you haven't left a floppy in the drive right!?!?!

It does sound like a problem with the disk itself then. Before you do anything, I would open it up, and then re-seat the hard drive. Most Laptop HD's just clip in and out. Could be that it's just a bit loose.
Otherwise, it could be an actual disk failure. How old is the system?

Sleipnir

I would also take a look at the following URL. The recovery CD may be able to help you, or is that what you have already tried
link
and here is where you get support for Advent laptops. You may need to call them if the procedure to get at the Hard drive isn't obvious.
support

greystreeks

Thanks Kananga

the only problem I have with opening my laptop is that Advent have hidden most of their componants. I inserted RAm into it and I had alot of trouble. Once the Keyboard is lifted up there are 3 pannels to remove and then you can get to the motherboard but its a bit tricky trying to mind the ribbon belonging to the Key board.

I will tackle it thisevening and I will let you know how I get on,

Thanks again

Sleipnir

yeah components in laptops are always a little trickier to get at. You should be able to find a document from Advent support that has a step-by-step guide to replacing parts.

Typedef

Disk failure hmm?

Sounds like you may have some broken sectors on your hard disk and the boot process is failing.

To be honest, this doesn't sound like a FS error or the like.

It 'sounds' like you may have a(few) bad blocs on your hard disk, which is preventing boot after a certain stage, initialisation.... probably when your OS tries to read information from one of the bad blocs.

The only way to be sure is to do a format with bad bloc checks turned on.

greystreeks

Cheers Typedef,

I will keep you informed Im not to inclined to format as I will loose my data but from the sound of things I have lost it already.

I will search the support site Kananga and see what I come up with. I know that Advent computer support is not the best. I had trouble with my DVD rom dive before and got it replaced I have a 2 year warranty still left on my machine I took out a 5 year warranty when I bought my machine to keep my A** covered. Thanks for your help i will keep ye informed.

Greystreeks

Cyrus

even if theres a prob with the disc ur data is prob still there and if its important to u im sure it could be retrieved, ie u can get 2.5" to 3.5" convertors and set the floppy hd up as a slave on a desktop pc and get the data from it

Sleipnir

Don't forget that it is the BIOS that is reporting the boot failure, not the hard drive. The BIOS is unable to see/start the hard drive for some reason.
Personally, I would eliminate loose connections, power failure etc before thinking about a format.
Plus, if the BIOS cannot see the hard drive in the first place, you can't very well format it!
Can you hear the hard drive spinning up? Does it make any unusual sounds?

Sleipnir

what happened with this one Greystreeks?

greystreeks

Well I still havent found what the problem is I cracked it open and I checked all cables and put it back together again . Then Ii rangthe manufacturers and they had me do a few tests on it and they have determined that it is a hard disk problem (Ummm as if I didnt tell them that) so they are going to take it back and replace my hard drive. Thanks for all your help Kananga I will let you know when all has been fixed and back in operation.

Greystreeks