PC trouble shooting by Chinese whispers...
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I'm trying to help out a mate who's got an ill PC. He says he set the thing to check disk upon start up and restarted his PC. The PC checked through C: OK, but got stuck trying to do the same for D:. As I say, this is troubleshooting by Chinese whispers (from a non-PC expert) so it's a bit vague, but I think he said there's a blinking cursor on the screen and that's it. Hoping it was just being slow, he left it like that overnight but the situation is the same. I read somewhere that CHKDSK could be the final straw if the HDD is already physically damaged. This PC is a desktop, so, yes, that's possible, but not extremely likely... unless my mate has omitted some very obvious information. Any ideas on reviving this PC, greatly welcome!
Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike... me...
Maybe it's a jumper setting. Is the D drive set to slave?
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Maybe it's a jumper setting. Is the D drive set to slave?
TommyTomToms wrote:
Maybe it's a jumper setting. Is the D drive set to slave?
Cheers. Will try asking that, but don't know if my mate can figure that out... If you have C: as your application drive and D: as your data drive, does that specify that property?
Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike... me...
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TommyTomToms wrote:
Maybe it's a jumper setting. Is the D drive set to slave?
Cheers. Will try asking that, but don't know if my mate can figure that out... If you have C: as your application drive and D: as your data drive, does that specify that property?
Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike... me...
You are talking about two different things. D set to slave means that there is a physical jumper on the back on the hard disk telling the bios to consider this disk as a slave disk. Having a C: drive as application drive and D: as data drive is how you setup your OS to use the disks, once they have been recognized by the BIOS.
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TommyTomToms wrote:
Maybe it's a jumper setting. Is the D drive set to slave?
Cheers. Will try asking that, but don't know if my mate can figure that out... If you have C: as your application drive and D: as your data drive, does that specify that property?
Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike... me...
On your data drive you have to physically change the jumper. There should be a little diagram on the HDD case. http://attachments.techguy.org/attachments/155496d1251677239/hard-drive-jumper-.jpg[^]
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You are talking about two different things. D set to slave means that there is a physical jumper on the back on the hard disk telling the bios to consider this disk as a slave disk. Having a C: drive as application drive and D: as data drive is how you setup your OS to use the disks, once they have been recognized by the BIOS.
Rage wrote:
You are talking about two different things. D set to slave means that there is a physical jumper on the back on the hard disk telling the bios to consider this disk as a slave disk. Having a C: drive as application drive and D: as data drive is how you setup your OS to use the disks, once they have been recognized by the BIOS.
Cheers. That's going to be interesting... Not only is this Chinese whispers, it's a case of at least two blind mice... Anyway, I'll ask... In the mean time, if it is a slave drive, how do you get out of this situation? I'm guessing you'll just have to stop it trying to scan D: on start up. I get the impression the PC is not responsive at this stage....
Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike... me...
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I'm trying to help out a mate who's got an ill PC. He says he set the thing to check disk upon start up and restarted his PC. The PC checked through C: OK, but got stuck trying to do the same for D:. As I say, this is troubleshooting by Chinese whispers (from a non-PC expert) so it's a bit vague, but I think he said there's a blinking cursor on the screen and that's it. Hoping it was just being slow, he left it like that overnight but the situation is the same. I read somewhere that CHKDSK could be the final straw if the HDD is already physically damaged. This PC is a desktop, so, yes, that's possible, but not extremely likely... unless my mate has omitted some very obvious information. Any ideas on reviving this PC, greatly welcome!
Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike... me...
Are C and D on separate physical drives, or partitions of the same disk? (if the latter, jumper settings probably won't matter). Does the OS refuse to boot after the chkdsk? (blinking cursor on screen == every time after power on, or when chkdsk run?) Are you trying to recover the data as well? If so, it would be better to leave it alone as much as possible, and boot from a different disk. Messing with it will only make things worse.
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Are C and D on separate physical drives, or partitions of the same disk? (if the latter, jumper settings probably won't matter). Does the OS refuse to boot after the chkdsk? (blinking cursor on screen == every time after power on, or when chkdsk run?) Are you trying to recover the data as well? If so, it would be better to leave it alone as much as possible, and boot from a different disk. Messing with it will only make things worse.
Indivara wrote:
Are C and D on separate physical drives, or partitions of the same disk? (if the latter, jumper settings probably won't matter).
There's a point... I'm starting to think it's the latter...
Indivara wrote:
Does the OS refuse to boot after the chkdsk? (blinking cursor on screen == every time after power on, or when chkdsk run?)
I think that the chkdsk gets stuck so it doesn't get as far as "OS refusing to boot". But if you mean that the OS doesn't boot, that's correct.
Indivara wrote:
Are you trying to recover the data as well? If so, it would be better to leave it alone as much as possible, and boot from a different disk. Messing with it will only make things worse.
Nope. Data is happy and alive elsewhere. Would reinstalling the OS work?
Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike... me...
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Indivara wrote:
Are C and D on separate physical drives, or partitions of the same disk? (if the latter, jumper settings probably won't matter).
There's a point... I'm starting to think it's the latter...
Indivara wrote:
Does the OS refuse to boot after the chkdsk? (blinking cursor on screen == every time after power on, or when chkdsk run?)
I think that the chkdsk gets stuck so it doesn't get as far as "OS refusing to boot". But if you mean that the OS doesn't boot, that's correct.
Indivara wrote:
Are you trying to recover the data as well? If so, it would be better to leave it alone as much as possible, and boot from a different disk. Messing with it will only make things worse.
Nope. Data is happy and alive elsewhere. Would reinstalling the OS work?
Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike... me...
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Indivara wrote:
Are C and D on separate physical drives, or partitions of the same disk? (if the latter, jumper settings probably won't matter).
There's a point... I'm starting to think it's the latter...
Indivara wrote:
Does the OS refuse to boot after the chkdsk? (blinking cursor on screen == every time after power on, or when chkdsk run?)
I think that the chkdsk gets stuck so it doesn't get as far as "OS refusing to boot". But if you mean that the OS doesn't boot, that's correct.
Indivara wrote:
Are you trying to recover the data as well? If so, it would be better to leave it alone as much as possible, and boot from a different disk. Messing with it will only make things worse.
Nope. Data is happy and alive elsewhere. Would reinstalling the OS work?
Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike... me...
One more thing - what brand is it? some manufacturers provide their own diagnostic utilities (in the disks that ship with the PC), and some that run from the BIOS (usually hit del or F2 on booting). Dell has the shortcut key Ctrl + Alt + D (or Ctrl + Shift + D, or some similar combination) which runs the disk diagnostics on boot. -- update -- OK more ideas, just for the record
- Listen for clicking clacking noises from the disk, usually happens when the controller fails (I think), and the heads thrash around.
- Look for the disk in the BIOS or boot-up screen. It may have disappeared altogether
- Make sure it is actually the disk - unplug it and see what message appears (alternatively, disable from BIOS if unplugging is difficult)
- (My usual thing, when cause is unknown) Unplug everything on motherboard, blow/suck dust bunnies, wipe contacts, put back in one. Start with the bare minimum - power, memory, graphics.
Caution - only recommended if your friend is confident of not breaking anything... BTW I'm leaving work now, won't be replying for some time
modified on Monday, December 13, 2010 9:02 AM
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One more thing - what brand is it? some manufacturers provide their own diagnostic utilities (in the disks that ship with the PC), and some that run from the BIOS (usually hit del or F2 on booting). Dell has the shortcut key Ctrl + Alt + D (or Ctrl + Shift + D, or some similar combination) which runs the disk diagnostics on boot. -- update -- OK more ideas, just for the record
- Listen for clicking clacking noises from the disk, usually happens when the controller fails (I think), and the heads thrash around.
- Look for the disk in the BIOS or boot-up screen. It may have disappeared altogether
- Make sure it is actually the disk - unplug it and see what message appears (alternatively, disable from BIOS if unplugging is difficult)
- (My usual thing, when cause is unknown) Unplug everything on motherboard, blow/suck dust bunnies, wipe contacts, put back in one. Start with the bare minimum - power, memory, graphics.
Caution - only recommended if your friend is confident of not breaking anything... BTW I'm leaving work now, won't be replying for some time
modified on Monday, December 13, 2010 9:02 AM
Thanks for your advice. They will come in handy at any other time when I get landed with an ill PC. But as you guessed right, I don't think my mate is up for opening up the box. Last I heard he was going straight to re-installing the OS. At least all this happened just as he finished his annual full backup of the PC!
Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike... me...
