Hard drive crashing

[toothpaste]

Hi. I bought a 1TB laptop hard drive a few months ago and about 2 weeks after i got it it started crashing/freezing. Im not sure if this is a problem with the hard drive or the laptop. The laptop is an acer aspire 5535 and the hard drive is a "SAMSUNG HN-M101MBB". When the hard drive crashes the activity light is just on. I thought it might be an overheating problem because it only happens when im rendering something or playing a game. Is there something i can do about this without replacing the drive?

[IAntDemo]

open command prompt and type chkdsk /r

don't you think it's because the computer can't handle the games you play and rendering a vid right? that requires massive memory.. laptops aren't built really for gaming and editing, unless it's expensive.

Game you playing and laptop specs?

[toothpaste]

My laptop is a few years old but runs Minecraft, TF2 and GMod with no problems. I dont think its gaming that causes the hard drive to crash because it has happened while browsing or just using steam. I tried chkdsk but it wouldnt run so i need to restart to try that. I have run checks using windows before and found no problems. Here are the specs:

CPU: AMD Athlon X2 Dual-Core QL-62 2.00GHz
RAM: 4.00GB
Graphics: ATI Radeon HD 3200
OS: Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit

[IAntDemo]

but you didn't say that you see you said:

I thought it might be an overheating problem because it only happens when im rendering something or playing a game. Is there something i can do about this without replacing the drive?

It only crashes on a game or rendering , this is why I said that..

i'm guessing the harddrive is faulty tho.. try run a diagnoses test, restart the laptop , guessing it has a diagnoses tool right?

[toothpaste]

Sorry i meant mostly happens while gaming or rendering. Im going to try the drive in another pc soon to see if its the laptop or the drive. If the hard drive is faulty i will replace it with another 1TB, do you know any good drives? I restarted to run the chkdsk but the drive crashed at 10%. By diagnoses tool do you mean software or something built into the laptop? if software do you know a free one?

[IAntDemo]

So it crashed? sounds like a bad sector my friend

Some laptops have a diagnoses tool just when you start it up.. turn it on and it should say press 'key' to run diagnoses

If not one of these, chose one that fits you

7 Free Hard Drive Testing Software Tools

[toothpaste]

Im not completely sure about sectors but i had an 80gb drive a while ago that made a clicking sound when i tried to copy/read one of the files on it, if that was a bad sector then i dont think this is the same. When it crashes its like the power is disconnected from the drive, Theres no noise or anything like the laptop isnt on. I checked the boot screen but didnt find any diagnoses tool, only recovery, bios and boot selection. Thanks for the link i'll look at that now. I tried a hard drive monitor and the drive was running at over 40C, is that too much for a hard drive?

---------- Post added at 11:50 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:55 PM ----------

I just tried seatools to test the drive, i started a short test and it found nothing so I tried a long test, it got to 4% then the screen froze, the hard drive stopped and now windows won't start so I'm waiting for the laptop to cool down now.

---------- Post added at 11:56 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:50 PM ----------

The laptop is cool now and it still won't boot so I'm trying startup repair.

---------- Post added 01-02-2012 at 12:03 AM ---------- Previous post was 01-01-2012 at 11:56 PM ----------

Sorry for posting so much. Startup repair worked. Testing the drive made it worse so is there anything else i could try? Thanks for the help.

[IAntDemo]

it's crashing because it's testing it and while it's testing it it's not going any further because the harddrive has bad sectors, if you don't want to accept this answer then I suggest trying another scanner.

40c is fine

I am 99% sure it is the harddrive

[toothpaste]

Ok. Thanks for the help. I will probably just get a new drive then, Do you know any good ones?

[IAntDemo]

laptop?

this is the cheapest one I found

Samsung M7 320GB 2.5" SATA Laptop Hard Drive HM320II (8808993199471) | eBay

Am joking lol

1TB Samsung SpinPoint M8 2.5" SATA-II HDD HN-M101MBB (8806071322681) | eBay

NEW SAMSUNG M7 320GB 2.5 SATA LAPTOP HARD DRIVE HM320II (8808993577422) | eBay

NEW TOSHIBA MK5061GSYN 500GB 2.5" SATA II 16MB CACHE 7200RPM HARD DISK DRIVE (5051868525506) | eBay

The last one's the quickest one