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| | | | Post in reply to: r3n3r4d3
Hey r3--
Thanks for the feedback letting me know you ran the bootrec commands
correctly. They are powerful when they work, and they have pulled me out
over the last 3 years with Vista and a couple times with builds of Win 7
recently very nicely. Sorry they didn't work.
I gave you a very simple way to test whether your hard drive is in the land
of the living and working in the post labled HP Hard Drive test. It isn't
100 percent perfect, but it's darn close.
I want you to do that simple test--click on the post labled HP Pavillion HD
Test, and I want you to follow these directions to use Seagate tools. Since
we're trying to diagnose something very important, whether we have a working
hard drive, I want you to run ***both tests.*** Seagate provides good
instructions at the link I'm going to give you, but if you have any
questions, don't hesitate to ask.
Seatools won't hurt your Windows installation at all. Scan the explanations
I provided in the tutorial, but don't spend a lot of time reading the
tutorial or the .pdf below it. The HP test is very reliable and takes just
seconds to start, so get that going. It takes 30-40 minutes to run.
Actually, if it says your HD passes, I'd go on and try the System Restores
and Last Known Good but to be sure Seagate is another test of your HD.
Seatools
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/support/downloads/seatools
Seatools Tutorial
http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=170511
Seatools Explanation
http://www.seagate.com/support/seatools/SeaTools_for_Windows.pdf
Remember if your hard drive passes both the Seatools test, and the simple
one I gave you that HP Pavillion provides at the bios setup reached by
tapping the F10 key, then I want you to run System restore at 3 places on
the menu you reach from tapping the F8 key. If none of the 3 is successful,
and by that I mean
Safe Mode
Safe Mode with Command
Safe Mode with Networking
then I want you to be sure and try Last Known Good. LKG is a longer
shot--it's a registry snapshot, but like in a football game, when you throw
a "Hail Mary pass" and you win--the crowd cheers, and the babes follow.
***System Restore***
Why run at 3 locations? Because often one will work when the other don't.
The same for last known good configuration at that menu. Many a person has
lost their information because they were ignorant of the fact they need to
try SR at all 3 locations + Last Known Good Configuration.
I'm sure glad you asked. System restore is still a very useful tool even in
the age of electric cars, Apple touch tablets, and seals shooting pirates
out of the water from destroyers, and the first Argentinean to win the
Masters.
System restore will not lose anything significant whatsoever. It does not
even track or impact your documents which will come back if it is
successful. All your settings will be intact. The only thing that you may
lose, despite the literally hundreds of articles I've read on it including
several from the members of the MSFT team who writes System Restore, after
having done many of them myself and for other people are
1) Applications that you installed AFTER the restore point.
2) Shortcuts that you put on the desktop or somewhere else AFTER the restore
point.
Those are usually not too significant to most people, and they become
completely insignificant if you get back everything else including your
settings intact.
What is system restore and why when it works is it as good as you say it is?
In Vista and Windows 7, System Restore is a snapshot of your settings and
everything else using a system from the Windows server technology that
originated in Win Server 2003 called Volume Shadow copies which back up your
registry and system files. VSS operates at the block level. It takes
snapshots of a file or folder on a specific volume at a specific point in
time. There are a lot of nuances, and I can give you a bibliography when you
have the time and desire to read it. There are nuance differences between
Vista Home and the more expensive versions, but the bottom line is
***You won't lose anything significant and sometimes you don't even lose
shortcuts or apps installed SINCE THE RESTORE POINT. If the restore point
is very recent, there aren't many of those likely. You will not lose your
documents or your schoolwork related files. I repeat you will not lose your
documents or your schoolwork related files.***
How System Restore's VSS Works MSFT Technet
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc785914.aspx
Good luck,
CH
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| | | | | Post in reply to: r3n3r4d3
r3--
It's looking like you then ***may*** have to replace the HD. But if I were
you, before coming to that conclusion, and seeing how much the local
information retrievers would charge you to get information back from it, I'd
sure run the Seatools diagnostics. And I would certainly try the system
restores and last known good since they cost nothing but a few minutes of
your time.
With these modalities, ya never know 'til you try and there is no downside
to doing them.
CH
10009- Replace Hard
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| | | | | On Sun, 12 Apr 2009 18:38:39 -0500, r3n3r4d3
wrote:
10009- Replace Hard
How much more "fail" can you get than "Replace Hard Disk"!??
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| | | | | On Sun, 12 Apr 2009 18:14:20 -0500, r3n3r4d3
wrote:
Not if you mean the System Restore that Windows uses.
If you mean "System Recovery"... yeah, it wipes everything.
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| | | | | On Sun, 12 Apr 2009 18:38:39 -0500, r3n3r4d3
wrote:
10009- Replace Hard
It failed. Replace it.
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| | | | | Post in reply to: Steve McGarrett
Hi Steve--
if you followed the thread, he was asking about F8 which reaches the Win
Advanced Options menu where you can acess system restore, some other
options, and "last known good configuration". Only system restore is
available behind the safe modes I mentioned in about 5 posts and linked.
You said "system recovery" (which is really a vague term) wipes everything.
If you mean the erratic and often no efficacy OEM piece of junk recovery
discs, or recovery partitions, they restore back to "factory settings" but
a high percent of the time do absolutely zip. I have hundreds of posts on
this group over 3 + years trying to fix Won't Boot Vistas, and I've never
recommended them since I did the same thing on the XP groups.
None of the options from Vista Startup Repair lose anything either when they
work, or when they don't.
None of the options I ever suggest lose anything significant. System
restore sometimes as I repeatedly said, can lose the shortcuts on the
desktop since the RESTORE point, or programs/updates installed since the
restore point. Otherwise it loses nothing when it works or when it does
not.
CH
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| | | | | Post in reply to: Cody Jarrett
Cody typed: "How much more "fail" can you get than "Replace Hard Disk"!??"
That's one exclmation point and two ?? from Cody.
That's a great question Cody. If you had read any of my posts, I
explained that explicitly, and I'm happy to teach it to you again. If you
read the literature on any of the hard drive tests they all have a
percentage of accuracy. It ain't 100% and the best like the HP utility at
its bios setup and the Seagate tools are about 75%- 90%. There are
thousands of others and their accuracy hovers in the 75% range.
We are talking about someone in college who in all probability may not have
enough money to pay someone to recover from his HD. Since there is NO DOWN
SIDE, it makes perfect sense to
1) Confirm the HP HD test that has an accuracy anywhere from 75-90% which
means it can be wrong a significant percent of the time with some other HD
test that is reliable--hence I recommended Seagate.
2) There is absolutely nothing to lose and everything to gain if the other
options I suggested work and the OP falls in the category where the HD tests
missed the boat.
If you check, you'll find that there are 100s of medical lab and other
tests. They all have a percentage of accuracy, of false positives, and
false negatives. It's no different here. That means to stop with the HP HD
diagnostic is to risk the chance of being wrong with a big expense at the
other end.
CH
10009- Replace Hard
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| | | | | Post in reply to: Steve McGarrett
If MDs practiced medicine the way you suggest Steve, a lot more people would
be dead. You didn't read the info I provided, and you're ignorant of the
fact that no hard drive diagnostic is 100%. The best are 75-90% accurate.
That's why as in medicine, it's wise to do another test.
And again there is no downside to using the F8 options at all. If HP and
Seagate fall in the category that the HD is still intact, and there's a 25%
chance they do, then the OP has thrown a lot of money away when he could
have recovered his OS for free with a few minutes time.
I had a Dell diagnostic I ran on a box that began to say that said the HD
had failed after the firmware or DELL screen. It booted perfectly. I ran a
specific Dell diagnostic run by the hardware team at Roundrock, and not
understood by the contract phone support for Dell at all. It confirmed the
hard drive was "failing."
Two years later, I was still running the hard drive with the same speed, and
no problems booting or problems requiring a chkdsk or anything else with the
HD. So my experience there fell in the 25% false positive range.
When you test patients for SLE or Lupus, many of the major tests have as
high as a 35%-40% false positive. You'd be stupid to Dx them all with
Lupus. There are a list of about 50 other situations where the Lupus lab
tests are false positive as well. Do yourself a favor or not and google for
specificity, sensitivity, false positive, and false negative.
My advice was on the money.
BTW you didn't volunteer it but to jump and pay for hard drive recovery can
average about $1600. That's more than valet parking on a Saturday night and
a lot for a college student or a good number of people.
CH
10009- Replace Hard
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| | | | | Post in reply to: Richard G. Harper
Where in your area Richard, is recovery of data from a HD by a service
affordable for a college student with average funds for a college student?
How much is the fee on average? Many of the services I've talked to want a
minimum of $1600.
How many college students do you know who have that kind of discretionary
money?
CH
news:TAXyK1uJHA.1300@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...
10009 - Replace Hard Disk
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Ok, my Gf is having the same sorta issue on her HP pavilion dv6000. But
you guys seem to keep talking about the HDD... I dont know about you but
I can load up safe mode in either comand prompt or /w networking. HDD
still there, all data is fine. If you can access safe mode i recommend
it for backing up your shtuff before bringing it to a "pro". Ive lost
data because idiot "pros" just decide to do a complete reinstall....
morons!
So here's my theory. Video card issue. Although, i did read something
about it being a CPU issue, but maybe the problem differs with the users
and forum threads ive seen about this.
Another theory..... which isnt much of a theory its more a
statement.... VISTA IS HORRIBLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! DELETE IT NOW AND BURN
THE CD/DVD IN A RITUAL, CLEANING YOUR SOULS!!!!! either that, and/or HP
Pavillion is the problem with its cheap HP parts. Thank god for
warrenty.
Anyways, I think the guys earlier saying to go to a "pro" is the best
solution, BUT, I recommend that you enter safe-mode, back your data up
and go to a pro. or even reinstall windows first(after backup) THEN go
to a "pro" if that fails. Just back up first >.< I lost 80gig of music i
was recording over 13 years after bringing my PC to a shop. Lucky I
recovered it.....
CIAOOO
-Halfhead
--
halfhead1004
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