MAJOR problem

cormthechippy

shut down the computer the other night (windows XP, dell dimension 3000) and not a bother. went to start it yesterday and i got "loading PBR for descriptor 2...done". i tried the recovery console, and that failed, and now i', getting "the primary IDE mater hard drive self monitoring system has reported that a parameter has exceeded its normal operating range. Dell recommends that you back up your data regularly. a parameter out of range may or may not indicate a potential hard drive problem. Strike the F1 key to continue, F2 to run the setup utility."

Striking F2 will take me to the bios. F1 continues me to a message "Load needed DLLs for kernel."

i googled, and it told me to boot from the XP cd, which i tried, and then it says to reinstall XP. however, if i want to reinstall XP, it tells me I must format drive C (the main hard drive with all our stuff on it) because there are errors on it.

Is my computer completely f*****? Is there any way to resolve this, and maintain all the files i had on it? or am i going to loose everything? maybe i should let experts look at it? cheers.

Ruu_Old

Will it go as far as giving you the option to boot into safe mode? You can try tapping F8 at startup and see if it gives you the option.

cormthechippy

thanks for the quick responce. it doesnt give any option to boot in safe mode, and F8 didnt work either.

Ruu_Old

I'm not really too sure if its a hardware problem with the main hard drive or not. Maybe you can take out the drive and plug it into another computer to get the data off it, I would say that might work. At least that way you could format it after that and then a fresh install.

Capt'n Midnight

cormthechippy wrote:

"the primary IDE mater hard drive self monitoring system has reported that a parameter has exceeded its normal operating range.

sounds like SMART reporting a hard drive problem

If you are lucky it's just the hot weather - try again when cool

if you have an F12 option - run the hard drive test [edit] after everything has been backed up [/edit]
or download a diags disk


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-Monitoring,_Analysis_and_Reporting_Technology

Thomas_S_Hunterson

There should be an option to do a repair installation or something, which basically rewrites your windows system folders, but keeps all the user profiles.

SouperComputer

SMART errors dont usually happen for "the crack". Dont do anything until you ascertian if there is any important information on the drive.

Testing it could be a bad idea as it may make a bad situation worse.

irlrobins

I agree with SC. Sounds like a physical HD failure. Repairing or reinstalling windows would be pointless. You prob only have a limited time left before HD is completely borked, so you're better off trying to back up your data. Mount the HD on a second PC, usually the best way of accessing it. If it refuses to be read, stick it in an air tight plastic bag and put in freezer for an hour or two. Then connect it up to PC (without thawing). That sometimes allows you to get it working long enough to get data off it.

Capt'n Midnight

SouperComputer wrote:

SMART errors dont usually happen for "the crack". Dont do anything until you ascertian if there is any important information on the drive.

Testing it could be a bad idea as it may make a bad situation worse.

good call with the not testing till you've backed up / recovered data