Is this a harddrive issue?

[jasperwilcox]

Let me preface this as many others do I'm sure with the obligatory "I don't know a ton about computers." I know more than the average grandma or whatever, but I'm certainly not an expert.

Anyway, I have an alienware PC someone else gave me, and it'd been running fine, and then a few days ago I went to turn it on, and the fans went on and the lights went on and everything looked normal, except it didn't seem like the harddrive was starting at all. My monitor didn't detect the harddrive starting either (it just sat there with the blinking LED like it does when the computer's off, it normally becomes a solid light when you turn the computer on, then images begin to display).

From what I can tell, the rest of the machine is fine, and I took the harddrive out of its slot in the tower and it feels like it's "working" as far as it's mechanically rotating or whatever, and I fiddled with the connections between it and the motherboard and such, but no luck. Does it sound like some internal problem with the harddrive? Maybe this is a textbook "busted harddrive" and I just don't realize it.

Thanks guys!

 

[jarlmaster47]

Yeah that's a hard drive problem. Get a new one, reinstall your os and you should be all set to go!

 

[Atomic Rooster]

Relax jarlmaster, there can be quite a few other things that are preventing his computer from starting.

First of all, how about posting up the specs of the machine. Things such as CPU, memory, graphics card, etc.

Does the machine "beep" at all on start-up?

 

[jasperwilcox]

Damn, you guys are awesome/quick to reply.

I guess I'm more of a novice than I expected (also, since I didn't purchase this computer myself I'm not sure about all the details). I know it's has a 160gb hard drive, 512mb memory, and that's about it (sad, I know). I honestly don't even know how fast the processor is. My brother gave me this computer (it was working just fine then) since he bought a laptop and didn't want a desktop anymore.

Sorry I'm not giving you guys much to work with. But to answer the last question, it does not beep when I turn it on, no.

 

[jarlmaster47]

That's a bad sign unfortunately. That means that it is in fact a hard drive issue. Same thing happened to me.

 

[jasperwilcox]

I had kinda figured it was, I just wanted to make sure I wasn't gonna go out a buy a harddrive (not that they're terribly expensive these days) and have that not solve the issue.

In an odd coincidence, I had bought an external drive a few weeks ago just because I had had a computer crash on my many years ago and didn't want to lose my info if that happened. So I had most of my files backed up already.

 

[Atomic Rooster]

OK, here's another question, did it ever beep at boot up?

Were there any signs of trouble before this happened? Go through and check to see that all cables and wires are firmly connected including your monitor cable.

 

[jasperwilcox]

Thanks for you replies too, Atomic.

As best as I can remember, it did used to beep. And although it's not blatantly obvious (because the fans are crazy on that machine) I'm pretty sure there's a "sound" missing as far as the hard drive "whirring" or whatever.

 

[Atomic Rooster]

Just for giggles, try removing and then reinstalling the memory. If you have multiple sticks, try booting with only one at a time to see if it could be a memory related problem.

 

[jasperwilcox]

Just for giggles, try removing and then reinstalling the memory. If you have multiple sticks, try booting with only one at a time to see if it could be a memory related problem.

Hmm, no luck with that either.